Female Deputies React With Shock to E-Mail Attacks

Some messages were angry, others were X-rated, and many openly derided female deputies at the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.

Many women on the force were shocked that a link to the e-mail survey by Digital City was featured on the Web page of the powerful Assn. for Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs--along with scores of anonymous replies from purported male deputies expressing their aversion to female colleagues in hostile and grotesquely sexual terms.

Some shrugged off the comments, but one deputy said she felt like quitting. A few posted angry responses and said they were going to withdraw from the association.

“I am DISGUSTED that my own union would have this Web page that invites more fear, stereotyping, dissension and hostile work environment for hard-working deputies like myself,” wrote one “Female Deputy,” who said she was a 13-year department veteran.

Police experts said the episode underlined the tensions arising nationwide, as women begin to integrate male-dominated police forces. About 14.2% of Los Angeles’ deputies are women--compared with 14.8% nationwide. But there are only 233 female patrol deputies--about 8% of the patrol force.

The association scandal erupted after Sheriff Lee Baca announced plans to promote female deputies into patrol positions ahead of equally or more qualified men. He rescinded the proposal when the association threatened to sue and Digital City posted a Web survey of reaction to his plan.

The association linked the site to its home page, inviting comment. Although some self-described male deputies expressed thoughtful opposition to Baca’s proposal and a few even backed it, a torrent of respondents simply lamented that women were ever allowed on patrol in the first place.

“Being a cop is for men only. Always has and always will be,” wrote “bandit.” “How come these broads can’t stick with the chick jobs and stop complicating everything? It was a horrible mistake for men to ever allow chicks on the job.”

Like some respondents, “bandit” launched into obscene descriptions of female deputies.

“I can’t say I’m surprised,” said Penny Harrington, the former police chief of Portland, Ore., who now directs the National Center for Women and Policing.

Harrington said the Web site fracas “illustrates one of the age-old problems of moving women into the mainstream of policing. Anything done to promote women is protested by the union as being unfair to men.”

And opposition to female staff is often expressed in viciously personal terms, with women being derided as talentless affirmative action hires or as getting promotions for intimately personal reasons, she said.

“It’s very common to have attacks on a sexual basis. It’s a male-bonding weapon against the women,” Harrington said. “It’s never professional, like ‘she really messed up that burglary investigation.’ It’s always personal.”

The association removed the link to the survey Wednesday after getting shocked phone calls. But a union insider defended the decision to provide it--saying that it was a “broad-based issue of interest to the membership.” He said the deputies’ association posted a disclaimer that it did not condone the views expressed.

Baca on Monday called the e-mails “trash communication” and said he would work to ensure that women feel more welcome. He said he has not given up on his attempts to move more women to patrol and will meet with union leaders to accomplish that goal. He has issued a new set of departmental core values that forbid sexual harassment and other manifestations of sexism and racism.

“We want to build a Sheriff’s Department that everyone can feel comfortable with,” Baca said.

Sgt. Jan Campbell, the daughter of an officer and sister of the department spokesman, called the anonymous messages “very, very sad.”

“I’m a firm believer that if you have something to say, sign your name,” she said. “I think a lot of problems are caused by overreacting and immaturity. I truly believe that if these messages are from the department, they reflect the feelings of a very small percentage.”

But she denied that the Web page was reflective of the overall status of women in the department.

“There has not been one time that I have not been treated with respect as a female and as a sergeant,” Campbell said.

But others, like “Lady Deputy,” called the Web page the tip of a deeply discriminatory iceberg. By posting it, the association was simply “condoning and escalating the hostile work environment that we as female deputies have to face,” Lady Deputy wrote. “True, there are those that get promoted and receive special assignments based on their gender, but most of us are dedicated, hard-working deputies.”

Attorney Steven Rottman, who has represented female deputies in a number of sexual harassment complaints, called the messages “a window into the soul of the department.”

“We see their true colors coming out,” Rottman said. “You are not going to find male deputies saying those kinds of things to females. They know they will get into trouble. What we see is a very subtle hazing rather than overt gender harassment.”

Dennis Harley, an attorney who recently won a court order mandating that 25% of department promotions to sergeant be women, said the posting of the Web link underscored a “basic lack of understanding” of how sexual harassment is used--like racial slurs--to make it harder for some officers to advance in their careers.

“They just don’t get it,” Harley said. “They put this filth on their Web site under their name and under their badge and they think they’re doing a service? It’s ridiculous.”

Harley said deputies are discouraged from filing formal sexual harassment complaints. If they file complaints anyway, they are “drummed out” on stress leave--while their male harassers typically stay on the job, he said. There are 31 sexual harassment complaints now pending, two of them involving criminal allegations, he said.

The issues of sexual harassment and gender equity at the department were placed under court supervision in July 1988 as part of a settlement in a lawsuit brought by a veteran deputy, Susan Bouman, who was denied promotion to sergeant.

The department was forced to spend $4.5 million to create a sexual harassment policy and training and an improved system to report harassment complaints--which have continued to occur at the same frequency since then, experts say.

In 1995, Deputy Carmen Higuchi filed a complaint telling of finding a dildo on her patrol car and her male colleagues standing nearby laughing at her reaction. Training Officer Pamela-Lee Carey found a snapshot of a man masturbating in her patrol car glove box.

In 1995, Jamila Bayati retired after enduring what she described as pervasive harassment:

According to court filings, one sergeant posted a poster of a topless female with a photo of him pasted at her crotch, simulating oral sex, and gathered other male deputies to watch a video of half-nude women singing an obscene song. A deputy hounded her for dates and when she rebuffed him, told her co-workers she was a lesbian. Another deputy openly referred to sanitary napkins as “manhole covers.”

In August 1997, U.S. District Judge Robert Takasugi found that the county had done “little or nothing” to correct gender inequities in the department’s hiring and promotion practices. He fined the department $10,000 a day and warned the department “for the last time” to comply.

Women are still highly underrepresented in the high-paying crime fighting positions or top jobs like detectives and the SWAT team--which just accepted its first female member. Most women in the department work the lower-paying custody jobs.

And female deputies at the Carson station--which women find especially hospitable and well-managed--endure rumors that the station is a mecca for “lesbian” officers.

Some female deputies, like Paula Tokar, 29, say they have never encountered such bigotry.

“I don’t walk into work going, ‘Oh, they hate me. I’m a girl,’ ” Tokar said. “I feel accepted and wanted here. I don’t come in feeling like there is any animosity toward me.”

Campbell, 42, a supervisor at Century station, where only eight of the 280 deputies are women--and where women have told department watchdogs they feel unwelcome--said she has never experienced that type of hostility either.

“We do recruit from the human world and we do have problems,” said Campbell, who also was referred by the department. “Have I had problems just because I’m dealing with human beings? Yes. But it’s nothing I would call harassment.”

Tokar and Campbell oppose Baca’s proposal to give preference to women--as did several self-described female deputies who wrote to the Web site--although Campbell agrees that more women should be on patrol.

But “to pull the women out before other guys is wrong,” Campbell said. “I don’t see this as a male/female role. We are all deputy sheriffs.”

Except, said a female deputy who contacted The Times independently, some of the male deputies still do not see their female colleagues as equals.

“There is animosity,” she said. “Any time someone challenges something that has been around a long time--women entering a man’s world--people are going to feel threatened.”

She said male deputies often accept their female colleagues in the academy and for the first few years on duty--but resent being passed over for women, even if they are considered worthy.

“You hear, ‘Oh wow, she’s really good,’ ” the female deputy said. “But God forbid they get promoted ahead of a male deputy, because suddenly it would be like who is she sleeping with, the little slut. Even if she deserves [promotion].”

The Web site uproar concerned Harrington, who said she hopes that working conditions improve as more women move into patrol and crime fighting positions.

“But I pity those women who are the first to go out there,” Harrington said.