A jury this week awarded $11.5 million to a former Los Angeles police Okay-9 handler who sued town alleging that his supervisors retaliated and discriminated in opposition to him partially due to his Samoan ancestry.
The officer, Mark Sauvao — pronounced “su-VOW” — alleged he was unfairly punished after he reported a few of his colleagues had known as him names similar to “cannibal” and “barefoot coconut tree-climber.” One supervisor additionally reportedly referred to him as being Tongan; Sauvao took the remark as an affront given the bitter early historical past of warfare and enslavement between Samoa and Tonga.
Sauvao, who continues to be with the division, additionally alleged that officers unfold false rumors that he tried extorting fellow Okay-9 handlers by refusing to coach them until they gave him their extra time hours.
Town can nonetheless problem the dimension of the jury award.
From 2005 to 2017, Sauvao was assigned to the division’s elite bomb detection Okay-9 unit. The 30-year LAPD veteran stated his troubles started a number of years after his promotion to canine coach, which got here with further pay and advantages.
After studying of the rumors about him, Sauvao stated, he demanded that the unit’s commander, Lt. Raymond Garvin, intervene and launch an investigation into the officers spreading them. Neither occurred, he alleged.
One other colleague testified in a deposition that Garvin relayed the extra time allegations in opposition to Sauvao to different officers at a roll name held at a close-by bagel store. Somebody within the group accused Sauvao of being the “ringleader” of a faction inside the Okay-9 unit that known as itself the “P.M.-Watch Mafia,” based on the testimony. Sauvao denies these claims.
Garvin beforehand filed his personal lawsuit in opposition to town alleging {that a} division higher-up conspired to kick him out of the unit, which led to a $700,000 settlement.
Sauvao stated he ultimately introduced the matter as much as Capt. Kathryn Meek of the Emergency Companies Division, which oversees the Okay-9 unit and the bomb squad. As an alternative of investigating his stories, Sauvao stated, inside affairs detectives confirmed as much as search his locker a number of months later, which he believed was in retaliation for making his earlier complaints.
Sauvao stated his request to contact a police union consultant after the search was denied.
He was later ordered to endure psychiatric testing and ultimately transferred to a much less fascinating task that induced him to be separated from his police Okay-9 named Pistol, based on the lawsuit.
Sauvao’s legal professional, Matthew McNicholas, stated the award was the most recent he has received in circumstances involving members of that Okay-9 unit. Two different circumstances from round 2008 led to jury awards of $3.6 million and $2.2 million, respectively, he stated. That the identical unit continues to have issues 15 years later suggests an absence of oversight, he stated.
“It tells me that command continues to do what it needs and that until any person like me digs in, they get away with it,” McNicholas stated. “Ninety-eight p.c of the division are hard-working folks that simply go to work, do their jobs and go house; the unlucky factor is that the opposite 2% have quite a lot of energy.”
Town legal professional’s workplace didn’t instantly reply to an e-mail looking for remark, and an LAPD spokeswoman stated the division wouldn’t focus on the case.
Sauvao’s claims had been just like these of one other Okay-9 handler who labored within the unit on the time, Alfredo Franco, who additionally sued town for discrimination and retaliation he reportedly confronted after standing up for Sauvao.
A number of of Sauvao’s former colleagues testified on his profit in depositions filed within the case, with one saying he had an “unblemished” popularity and one other describing the respect he commanded inside the area of interest group of police Okay-9 trainers nationally.