LAPD detective claims to have been sexually harassed by female supervisor in Mission Division

Los Angeles police officer Anita Stieglitz is suing the city, claiming her complaint of sexual harassment by a supervisor while working in the Mission Division was not properly handled by the department.

The lawsuit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court seeks unspecified damages for sexual harassment and failure to prevent sexual harassment.

Stieglitz was sworn in as an officer in 1996, promoted to detective in 2017, and began working on sex crimes in the Mission Division two years later.

In 2022, Detective Luz Montero became Stieglitz’s direct superior.

While working on a case in August of that year, Stieglitz asked her supervisor for advice on how to handle a case in which two female high school students reported being inappropriately groped by a male student.

When Stieglitz described the incident, she said Montero responded by grabbing her breasts and buttocks and saying, “Is that what you mean?”

Stieglitz said she complained to another supervisor, but no action was taken.

According to the lawsuit, Stieglitz was therefore forced to endure a hostile work environment in which Montero continued to harass, avoid, and act hostilely toward her. Stieglitz tried to avoid Montero and only interacted with her when someone else was present.

Stieglitz said she learned from another officer that she was not the only one who had been harassed or assaulted by her supervisor. Montero allegedly slapped the other officer on the butt and was also observed squeezing a civilian’s breast.

Fearing retaliation, Stieglitz waited to file another report on Montero until she was transferred from the Mission Division in January 2023 and then filed a complaint with the LAPD’s Professional Standards Bureau.

Finally, former police chief Michel Moore imposed on Montero “five days as a disciplinary measure for her conduct.”

The lawsuit argues that Stieglitz’s complaints were not taken seriously and that the LAPD failed to prevent or correct Montero’s conduct due to bias and personal connections.

It is alleged that the LAPD “routinely fails to take seriously complaints of sexual harassment filed by female police officers against other female police officers. In contrast, when female police officers file complaints against male police officers, those complaints are taken seriously and male police officers face disproportionately more severe disciplinary action than female police officers accused of the same type of sexual harassment.”

Stieglitz is seeking damages because she claims to have suffered psychological stress and health damage and fears that her career advancement will be hampered due to her damaged reputation.

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