Joaquin

INTRODUCTION

This case has a somewhat tortuous procedural history. Plaintiff Richard Joaquin, a Los Angeles Police Department officer, complained of sexual *1210 harassment by Sergeant James Sands in 2005. The department investigated and found Joaquin’s complaint unfounded. Sands then pursued a complaint against Joaquin for filing a spurious sexual harassment charge. Internal affairs investigated Sands’s complaint, agreed that Joaquin’s charge was without foundation, and recommended that the matter be adjudicated by a board of rights. The board of rights found Joaquin’s charge to have been fabricated and recommended termination. The chief of police adopted the recommendation, and Joaquin was terminated effective March 2006.

Joaquin filed a petition for writ of mandate. The superior court granted the petition and ordered Joaquin reinstated, concluding that the board of rights’s findings were not supported by the weight of the evidence.

Following his reinstatement, Joaquin filed the present action against the City of Los Angeles (City), 1 alleging that his termination was in retaliation for filing a sexual harassment complaint in violation of the California Fair…