Orange County D.A’.s office again faces allegations of sexual harassment and retaliation
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- The lawsuit by a former prosecutor alleges she was sexually harassed and retaliated against while working for the Orange County district attorney’s office.
- The Orange County district attorney’s office said it has launched an investigation into the allegations of sexual harassment with an outside agency.
A former Orange County prosecutor alleges she was sexually harassed by a supervisor and retaliated against by superiors during her time at the Orange County district attorney’s office, according to a recently filed lawsuit.
The legal action, filed last week in Orange County Superior Court, is the latest in a series of workplace lawsuits filed against Dist. Atty. Todd Spitzer and his office, some of which have already been settled for millions of dollars and resulted in court rulings against Spitzer and his staff.
The most recent lawsuit, like previous ones, alleges an environment of retribution inside Orange County’s prosecutor’s office.
The former prosecutor, identified in court filings as Jane Doe, alleges she received repeated unwanted advances and sexually suggestive texts from a supervisor, was passed over for promotions, and unfairly became the subject of a disciplinary investigation when she took her complaints to the human resources department. The former deputy district attorney also alleges she initially decided not to report her treatment out of fear she would be targeted.
“She was expected to remain silent, avoid drawing attention, and endure mistreatment or face retaliatory punishment,” the lawsuit said.
The suit claims that Doe’s supervisor, Jess Rodriguez, sent her unwanted, sexually suggestive texts, and would often go into her office to discuss his sex life and ask her about hers.
In one instance, Doe alleges Rodriguez texted her a message, telling her, “I need to get in some quality time watching you bend over to reach the projector.”
The alleged sexual harassment, according to the suit, began in April 2023. In another instance, Rodriguez allegedly texted her and asked what she was wearing the next day.
“Gimme something to have sweet dreams about tonight,” the text said, according to the lawsuit.
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Rodriguez did not respond to requests for comment on the allegations.
Kimberly Edds, spokesperson for the Orange County district attorney’s office, said the office first became aware of the allegations in March, when it received a government claim from Doe outlining the allegations. Government claims are usually a precursor to a lawsuit.
Edds said Rodriguez was placed on administrative leave in March, and the district attorney’s office launched an investigation into the allegations of sexual harassment with an outside agency.
That investigation is ongoing, she said.
Rodriguez resigned from his position June 18.
The woman’s lawsuit also alleges that she faced “hostility and disparate treatment” at the hands of former supervising Deputy Dist. Atty. Richard Zimmer and former Senior Deputy Dist. Atty. Rebecca Reed.
Zimmer, now a judge in Orange County Superior Court, did not respond to a request for comment. A court spokesperson, in an email, told The Times that ethics rules prohibited Zimmer from commenting on any court proceedings.
Reed, who left the district attorney’s office March 28, did not respond to a request for comment.
Tim Gauthier, the attorney representing Doe, told The Times that some of the alleged incidents occurred during meetings with line prosecutors and supervisors, commonly referred to as “turkey shoots.” Prosecutors discussed their pending cases during the meetings, Gauthier said.
During those meetings, he said, his client was often denied the ability to make plea deals, he said, forcing her to prosecute more difficult cases and increase her workload to take more cases to trial.
His client reached out to human resources Aug. 7, 2024, and to the county’s Equal Employment Opportunity Access office Aug. 27, 2024. Those complaints made allegations about her treatment in the D.A.’s office but not about allegations of sexual harassment at the time.
While her complaint was pending on Aug. 21, the suit alleges, she was told she was the subject of a “investigatory meeting” looking into allegations that she had “misrepresented injuries to a victim,” Gauthier said.
“We suspect they were going through everything with a fine-tooth comb looking for anything to peg her with after the fact,” Gauthier said, adding that his client was cleared of wrongdoing.
In January, the county’s Equal Employment Opportunity Access office determined Doe’s complaint was unsubstantiated.
Gauthier said Doe, who left the Orange County district attorney’s office in September 2024 but is still practicing law, hesitated to reach out to human resources or to file complaints in part because of how other prosecutors had been treated in another high-profile case. That case involved Gary LoGalbo, a now-deceased former top prosecutor and the best man at Spitzer’s wedding.
According to multiple lawsuits filed against the county and district attorney’s office, LoGalbo was accused by several female prosecutors of sexual harassment, claims that were ultimately backed by an internal investigation.
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Victims of the harassment also claimed they were retaliated against for raising concerns. Another internal investigation also determined the district attorney’s office committed a “hostile and offensive” act when it released the internal investigation of sexual harassment against LoGalbo and described victims in a way that they were easily identified among office employees.
Among those who were identified was Doe, who was described in the report as a “female attorney who was Asian,” according to Doe’s lawsuit.
Edds said that since the LoGalbo investigation, the district attorney’s office has worked with the county’s Equal Employment Opportunity office, the county’s board of supervisors and the county’s human resources department to increase the frequency of harassment training for employees and supervisors.
That training includes informing employees of the multiple available venues for them to report any concerns about harassment, she said.
Gauthier, in an interview, said his client was discouraged by managers from taking legal action in the LoGalbo case.
“Managers told her, ‘Good, stay away from that, you don’t want to be a part of that,’” Gauthier said. “From those experiences she garnered that any report of sexual harassment was a bad career decision and would result in mistreatment.”
Orange County is still facing multiple lawsuits involving the LoGalbo allegations along with others against the district attorney’s office regarding claims of harassment and intimidation.
In June, a jury in San Diego awarded a former high-ranking female prosecutor, Tracy Miller, $3 million in damages. Miller alleged that she tried to shield other prosecutors who were allegedly harassed by LoGalbo, and was targeted after she raised concerns about Spitzer’s conduct.
In September 2024, the county also settled a lawsuit against a former investigator in the district attorney’s office, who alleged in a lawsuit that Spitzer and other top officials quashed an investigation looking into allegations of money laundering and extortion involving Spitzer.
The investigator, Damon Tucker, alleged that he was terminated and targeted. The county paid $2 million to settle the suit.
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