New lawsuits accuse Pasadena Police chief of sexual harassment, misconduct
The Pasadena Police Department and Chief Gene Harris are drawing renewed scrutiny after two new lawsuits alleging sexual harassment and racism were announced Tuesday.
Attorney Brad Gage announced the legal actions by Lt. Keith Gomez and Lt. Monica Cuellar, joining a handful of other officers who filed similar claims last year.
The new suits contain allegations against Harris, who is Black, such as him using the N-word in a meeting and asking Cuellar about the genital size of a city attorney.
They also allege several instances of sexual misconduct by Harris, including liaisons with a woman in his office, in which he installed a Murphy bed disguised as a cabinet.
Furthermore, the PPD allegedly has deputy gangs similar to those believed to exist within the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.
One of those gangs, the Veteranos, is only for officers who shot someone, Gage alleges.
A city of Pasadena spokesperson declined to address specific claims when reached by KTLA's Kareen Wynter, instead issuing a statement confirming that the city received at least one lawsuit on Tuesday.
'The City is reviewing the claim,' the statement said. 'The City takes all allegations of misconduct seriously. The City will follow all proper procedures to process the claim with full information. The allegations will be addressed through the appropriate legal process, not through the media.'
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Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
Many crime victims unaware of financial assistance available to them
A police car behind crime scene tape. While federal and state aid is available for crime victims, many say that they struggle to access it. (Getty Images) Aieda Harris knows the pain of gun violence. Her son Edward Reeves, an entertainer, a rapper whose stage name was 'Bambino Gold' based out of Atlanta, was shot and killed with a companion in 2017. His body was found in Macon County. Three years later, her son Christopher Noel Brown, was shot in June 2020. He died three months later. 'They said he didn't die of the gunshot wound, he had other health issues, issues with his heart and his kidney,' she said. 'But I am sure having two bullet holes in him didn't help at all.' She attempted to claim compensation for Edward's death under a state program allowing crime victims and their families to apply for help. But the process, she said, was difficult. 'The ABI (Alabama State Bureau of Investigation) agent, he put on the paperwork that my son was in the process of committing a crime when he died,' Harris said. 'He didn't have any proof of that at all. And so, since he put that on the paperwork, they denied my son's case. And they also said that we did not cooperate with them, which is crazy, I did everything that they asked us to do.' A spokesperson for the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, responsible for overseeing the Alabama State Bureau of Investigation, said its purpose is to be an independent fact-finding agency. 'When an individual is involved with a claim that is associated with the Alabama Crime Victims Compensation Commission (ACVCC), law enforcement officers are required to provide information concerning the case and list that information on the ACVCC application,' the agency said in its statement. 'Certain eligibility requirements must be met as determined by the Commission such as the claimant or victim must fully cooperate with law enforcement and the victim must not have contributed to the offense.' Harris was one of more than two dozen people that included activists and caregivers, along with other victims of violent crime who attended the 'Right to Heal: Access to Victim Compensation' hosted by the Alliance for Safety and Justice, a criminal justice reform organization based in Oakland, California, the first week of April. The event was organized by Aswad Thomas, vice president of Crime Survivors for Safety and Justice, the flagship project of the Alliance for Safety and Justice, who is a victim of gun violence himself. Thomas was shot by two attempted robbers while leaving a convenience store in Hartford, Connecticut in 2009. 'I think they fired eight or nine times, and I was shot twice in my back close to my spinal cord,' Thomas said. The physician told Thomas that the bullets were so close to his spinal cord that it wasn't clear whether he would walk again. 'That was when it hit me that I was a victim of gun violence,' Thomas said. 'My first, immediate thought, was 'Will I ever play basketball again?' My second thought — would I ever walk again?' Thomas did manage to walk again, but the injuries ended any hope of a professional basketball career. 'Like so many victims across the country, I never received any support or services after that incident, and law enforcement, who came to visit me several times during my recovery process to see how I was doing, never mentioned anything about victim services or where I could go to get help,' he said. Both Thomas and Harris are but two examples of people who were not able to receive assistance pertaining to instances of violent crime. Several who attended the April event praised victim assistance organizations for offering aid. But organizers of the event highlighted how many victims do not receive any support as they endured their painful experiences. Some, like Thomas, were unaware that support was available. But for others, such as Harris, highlight how the rules create barriers for people seeking assistance. Victims of violent crimes are entitled to compensation from money offered by the Office for Victims of Crime, a department within the U.S. Department of Justice. That agency manages the Crime Victims Fund that was established by the Victims of Crime Act of 1984, which is funded from fines and penalties from convictions in federal cases and not tax dollars, according to the agency's website. That money is then allocated to states, as well as federal and tribal victim assistance programs, in the form of grants. Typically, that money is distributed to victims through the state's crime victim's compensation program which can help defray costs such as medical care, counseling and lost wages, as well as funeral expenses for those who died because of an incident involving violent crime. States can operate their own programs to assist crime victims and outline how to fund such assistance they make available to crime victims. In Alabama, the Alabama Crime Victims Compensation Commission reviews applications submitted by victims and their families seeking financial assistance for funeral expenses, medical bills, as well as counseling services and wage compensation. But the commission, funded for decades by fines and fees from those convicted of crimes, struggled for years to collect the revenues it needed for crime victims. 'People who are assessed fines and fees generally don't pay them,' said Leah Nelson, formerly the research director at Alabama Appleseed who studies fines and fees in Alabama. 'So there isn't a lot of money to go around.' The Alabama Legislature in 2023 made a direct appropriation to the commission for the first time in history. It also received a second tranche of money totaling $1 million from the Governor's supplemental appropriation to help with paying claims to victims. Organizers of the Right to Heal event said few victims realize they have access to support. If they do reach out, it is difficult for them to obtain compensation because of the layers of rules and regulations pertaining to eligibility and the process. According to a report published in 2022 by the Alliance for Safety and Justice, only 4% of victims stemming from violent crime received any compensation to help with recovering from the incident. Of those who did not receive any aid, almost half would have wanted some type of assistance. Only 8% of victims of violent crimes surveyed as part of the report indicated that the criminal justice system provided sufficient support related to the violent crime incident. About 29% reported they were unaware that support was available. Another 28% stated that the criminal justice system was 'very unhelpful' while another 15% reported the system was 'somewhat unhelpful.' The report also indicates the criminal justice system offered little financial support because 87% of victims surveyed did not receive any financial assistance or economic support, while another 74% did not obtain any counseling or mental health assistance related to the violent crime incident. Much of the support that victims receive comes from sources that are not part of the criminal justice system. More than half, 52%, received help from family or friends. Another 28% got assistance from medical providers while 16% received assistance from a community-based program. Without adequate funding and having to navigate multiple obstacles, victims and their loved ones have little hope of receiving the resources they need to cope with the trauma of what they experienced. 'It would have been great to be educated about the psychological effects that I would be experiencing, and how to deal and cope with the PTSD, how to deal with the panic and anxiety attacks,' Thomas said. 'Learn to deal with the anger and the deep stage of depression I was in.' Thomas also wanted pain management education. He said he was discharged from the hospital with a set of pain medications but received little training on how they worked. He would have sought financial support to be placed in a different neighborhood instead of returning to the area where he was shot, staying in the living room in his mother's house. It would have been great to be educated about the psychological effects that I would be experiencing, and how to deal and cope with the PTSD, how to deal with the panic and anxiety attacks. Learn to deal with the anger and the deep stage of depression I was in. – Aswad Thomas, vice president, Crime Survivors for Safety and Justice Thomas would have also wanted the counselor or therapist to visit him at his mother's house. 'My car was impounded at the time of the shooting,' Thomas said. 'If a counselor or therapist was able to actually come to my home to provide those services, that would have helped.' Thomas and the Alliance for Safety and Justice, recognizing that victims are not receiving the support they need, established a model to allow more victims to receive compensation. The authors of the report suggested states remove the restrictions for victims who do not report the crime to law enforcement. 'But less than half — only 40% — of violent crimes are reported to the police at all. The victim may be too traumatized to go through the reporting process, may fear being revictimized, or may have reasons to distrust the justice system,' the report states. They also suggest expanding the eligibility for receiving aid to those on probation and parole, or those with a criminal record, as well as ending the eligibility exclusions to receive funding, as in the case of Harris and her son. 'When a violent crime occurs, the nature of the activities the victim may or may not have been involved in at the time of the incident should not bear on compensation decisions,' the report states. The Texas Legislature passed legislation in 2021 that allows a crime victim to claim compensation even if they are not ready to cooperate with law enforcement. Another bill that passed in Ohio, also in 2021, removed some eligibility restrictions for victims. Other states, including Florida, Pennsylvania, California and Michigan, have extended the deadline for people to submit a claim with their respective crime victim's compensation commissions. In California, the law more than doubled the limit from three years to seven years, according to the report. The Alabama Crime Victims Compensation has worked to make changes, such as shortening the application and making it available for victims and their families to complete online. They also continue to solicit funding to pay for operating expenses. However, commissioners are seeking more changes. In keeping with the actions of the other states, the commission seeks to extend the filing deadline for Alabama. 'How I was able to fill out the forms and get that done within the first year I just don't know,' said Darlene Hutchinson, one of the commissioners of the Alabama Crime Victims Compensation Commission who was a victim of violent crime herself. She said that the commission encountered many cases in which the application was filed after the one-year deadline for victims to file for claims, and that they are urging lawmakers to change that requirement. 'I think that is going to be huge for victims,' she said. 'A couple of my close victim-advocate friends who have been doing this work for 20-plus years, when I sent them a text message and told them that we are going to pursue this, they were just so excited.' HB 355, sponsored by Rep. Russell Bedsole, R-Alabaster, would have increased the deadline for ACVCC claims from one to two years after the original crime. 'I think this is one that all members, regardless of what side of the political aisle you are on, we can all agree this is something that we want to do to support the victims in our state,' Bedsole said. The bill passed the House but did not come to a vote in the Senate before the end of the 2025 legislative session. 'We were disappointed this bill did not get on the Senate calendar/agenda the final days of the session,' Hutchinson said after the session ended. SUPPORT: YOU MAKE OUR WORK POSSIBLE
Forbes
4 hours ago
- Forbes
Widespread Interactions With Criminal Justice System Cast Long Shadow On Retirement Savings
A lot of people get arrested and convicted in the United States. Those interactions with the criminal justice system cast long finacial shadows. This is true for retirement savings as well as calculations based on recently released Federal Reserve data show. People who have been arrested and convicted end up with lower retirement savings than people who have not been taken into custody. A recent Federal Reserve survey on people's economic situation includes a series of questions on whether people have been taken into police custody, convicted and served time. The same survey, the Fed's Survey of Household Economics and Decisionmaking (SHED) also asks questions about retirement savings. Interactions with the criminal justice system are fairly widespread. It is necessary to combine data years to make sure that sample sizes are large enough. In 2023 and 2024, 13.7% of adults said that they had been taken into custody in the past, 6.0% said that they had been convicted and 1.8% of people indicated that they served time. The respective shares of people are higher for Black and Latino people than for White people, with 17.3% of African-Americans and 17.9% of Latinos in 2023 and 2024 saying that they had been taken into custody, but only 12.5% of White adults said that this was the case. A lot of these racial differences are not explained by differences in criminal behavior, but rather, are the result of structural biases against Black and Latino adults. These interactions with the criminal justice system make it more difficult for people to save for retirement. For one, those who have a criminal record will face more labor market obstacles than those without a criminal record. They will work in less stable jobs and receive lower wages. This means that they will have a harder time qualifying for retirement benefits and have less money to put away towards retirement. In addition, people who have been arrested and convicted will have legal fees, but also face other economic challenges, for instance, in renting a house or apartment. They face higher costs, impeding their retirement savings and necessitating more liquidity in their retirement savings, for example, by withdrawing money pre-retirement or taking out loans on their retirement accounts. All of these factors could make it less likely that people have retirement accounts to begin with and more likely that the savings in those accounts grow more slowly. Earlier data already showed differences in retirement savings by interactions with the criminal justice system. Specifically, 48.4% of people that did not have a family member in prison or jail had any retirement savings in 2019, while this was the case for only 37.7% of people with an incarcerated family member. Recent Federal Reserve data for 2023 and 2024 provide additional details on the link between interactions with the criminal justice system and retirement savings. The data allow for a separation of respondents into three distinct groups: Those who were taken into police custody and were convicted, those who were taken into police custody, but were not convicted, and those who were not taken into police custody. The SHED also includes a number of key measures for retirement savings. It is, for example, possible to create one indicator whether people have any retirement benefit – a 401(k) type account, an IRA or a DB pension. It is also possible to create another indicator whether people increased the liquidity in their retirement savings by borrowing from their retirement accounts, withdrawing money from a retirement account or reducing their retirement account contributions. These actions all slow the growth of retirement savings as people need more liquidity. People who had any interactions with the retirement system fare worse in terms of retirement savings (see Figure below). The share of people who worked for somebody else and who were at least 25 years old with a retirement benefit is lower among those who were convicted (65.6%) than was the case for people who were taken into custody, but who were not convicted (76.5%), which was in turn much lower than the share of working people who were never taken into custody (84.5%). Having been convicted, regardless of whether the person served time or not, reduces the chance of having a retirement benefit by almost 19 percentage points, compared to somebody, who had never been taken into custody. And, those who were convicted also need more liquidity in their retirement accounts (see Figure above). In particular, 25.6% of those working for somebody else who were at least 25 years old and who had a retirement account also took out a pension loan, withdrew money before retirement or lowered their retirement plan contributions in 2023 and 2024. The respective shares for the other two groups were 16.2% and 16.0%. Having been convicted thus also goes along with a greater need for liquidity in retirement accounts, which could slow the growth of retirement savings. A substantial share of Americans are arrested and convicted. Convictions can cast a long financial shadow over people's lives. This includes negative correlations between arrests and convictions, on the one hand, and retirement savings, on the other hand. Those who have been arrested and convicted are much less likely to have any retirement plan, for instance. Financial insecurity follows criminal convictions for some time.
Boston Globe
7 hours ago
- Boston Globe
Trump's latest manufactured crisis has Los Angeles in its grip
Advertisement And it's hard to imagine them voting to trample local local enforcement. Get The Gavel A weekly SCOTUS explainer newsletter by columnist Kimberly Atkins Stohr. Enter Email Sign Up But then this administration has been just spoiling for a confrontation — especially in Los Angeles, with presidential advisers like And the president threw gasoline on the fire. Even as more demonstrators took to the streets, Advertisement Now there is no excuse for violence on the streets of any American city — and burning Waymo robot-driven cabs is hardly a good image for those with legitimate concerns about tactics used by immigration forces. The initial demonstrations were touched off by immigration raids at a garment factory and But throughout the weekend there was also no evidence that state and local police were incapable of dealing with the situation without the unasked-for federal intervention. In fact, some These are not the LA riots of 1992 in the wake of the verdict acquitting police officers of beating a Black man, Rodney King. Some Trump has long been the master of the manufactured crisis — the kind he has repeatedly used to justify broad use of executive powers. The president had barely finished taking the oath of office, when he declared a crisis at the border, requiring an Then there was the declaration of an equally nonexistent In April, with the Advertisement But by calling out the National Guard in California, on his own initiative and under false pretenses, Trump has entered new and more dangerous territory. 'The people who are causing the problems are bad people, they are insurrectionists,' Trump The president has not yet invoked the Insurrection Act but instead is using a section of the US Code on Armed Services ( That certainly explains Trump's escalating rhetoric and that of his administration, but it is an allegation that at the end of the day would have to be proven in court. 'Federal law enforcement officers were attacked by violent radicals and illegal criminals waving foreign flags because Governor Newsom was too weak to protect the city,' White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt Those 'foreign flags' were evidence not of an 'invasion' but for many Mexican-Americans in LA, But for this administration there is no detail that can't be used to distort the truth. 'Let me be clear: There is no invasion. There is no rebellion,' Advertisement Sure, Trump has long had it in for California, threatening to But the truly horrifying thing about Trump's current move is that it could happen to each and every state in the nation — or, more likely, to each and every Democratic state, especially when truth is so irrelevant to the Trump administration and facts are so fungible. The other danger is that having normalized the deployment of troops during manufactured crises, Trump will feel empowered to use them in even more forceful or aggressive ways if and when the nation faces actual crises. California's political leaders will not be fighting this battle on behalf of the rule of law alone. It's our fight too, and it won't be the last. Editorials represent the views of the Boston Globe Editorial Board. Follow us
