The California Supreme Court Saves the City Millions of Dollars

On June 30, 2021, the California Supreme Court denied former Rio Vista City Police Officer, John Collondrez’s, appeal in a multi-million-dollar lawsuit against the city.  This major victory for the city is precedent-setting and comes after years of hard work by Rio Vista City Attorney, Mona Ebrahimi.

Approximately two years ago ex-officer Collondrez settled with the city, allowing him to resign rather than be terminated.  This came after an in-depth internal investigation found that he had been dishonest in the matter of a hit-and-run incident.  The settlement specified his personnel records could not be released without prior notice to him, or as required by law.  

For over 40 years California law protected police officers and made it extremely difficult to get internal documents regarding an officer’s actions, even if the officer was found guilty of abusing police powers.  However, Senate Bill 1421 became law on January 1, 2019, allowing full disclosure of these records in certain cases.  In general, the new law allows for the release of internal documents in cases of officer dishonesty, sexual harassment by an officer, improper use of firearms, and unnecessary use of force causing injury or death.  An officer’s personal information such as home address, names of family members, medical records, and other private information are still legally protected.

When SB1421 went into effect the city was compelled to release information relating to ex-officer Collondrez’s resignation to the press and several members of the public.  Based on the new law, it was required that the information be released, whether ex-officer Collondrez was notified in advance or not.  A Rio Vista city executive remembers “…the law did change with Senate Bill 1421; the city was not compelled to provide Collondrez with notice before the subsequent records disclosures.  Senate Bill 1421 required disclosure of four categories of police officer personnel records, one of them which was records of dishonesty. Within days of this new law taking effect, the city began to receive public records act requests for these records…”.

When he learned of the records release, ex-officer Collondrez elected to sue the city for breach of contract, invasion of privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and intentional interference with prospective economic advantage.  This made for an overly broad and potentially expensive lawsuit to defend.  However, city attorney Ebrahimi was successful in getting the court to recognize this legal strategy as an attempt to discourage Rio Vista from pursuing a full lawsuit and force a settlement out of court.   The trial court, and later the appeals court, agreed this was the case and found for the city.  In April of this year, ex-officer Collondrez appealed this decision to the California Supreme Court and was denied a hearing.  This sealed the victory for Rio Vista.   

A League of California Cities summary of Senate Bill 1421 is clear why and to what extent police officers’ records may be released to the public.  The bill is based upon the need to protect honest, hardworking police officers and the public as well.  The summary reads … “to empower peace officers to fulfill their mission, the people of California vest them with extraordinary authority – the powers to detain, search, arrest, and use deadly force. Our society depends on peace officers’ faithful exercise of that authority. Misuse of that authority can lead to grave constitutional violations, harms to liberty and the inherent sanctity of human life, as well as significant public unrest.

The public has a right to know all about serious police misconduct, as well as about officer-involved shootings and other serious uses of force. Concealing crucial public safety matters such as officer violations of civilians’ rights, or inquiries into deadly use of force incidents, undercuts the public’s faith in the legitimacy of law enforcement, makes it harder for tens of thousands of hardworking peace officers to do their jobs, and endangers public safety.”

It is a tough and stressful job, and to the thousands of California peace officers who take on this challenge every day …