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Attitude shifts at cop shop

Sexual harassment claims took their toll on the bureau, but a sea change seems under way

By Jacob Quinn Sanders

The Portland Tribune, May 5, 2006, Updated Oct 30, 2009

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As a Portland police precinct commander, Derrick Foxworth had a sexual relationship with a civilian desk clerk who worked for him. But that on its own does not mean much to the average female Portland cop.

Of far greater concern was the man who was Foxworth’s second-in-command, who once told a male colleague, according to court records, “I have enough women here at the precinct, and I don’t need any more headaches.”

Stan Grubbs, commander of Southeast Precinct when he said that to officer Robin Long in 1998, later became assistant chief for operations under Foxworth Ñ the most powerful position in the Portland Police Bureau on day-to-day matters. Grubbs was a symptom of what some female officers felt was wrong with Foxworth’s leadership Ñ that their efforts, concerns and fears would never be good enough or important enough in a male-dominated Portland Police Bureau.

But those concerns are quieter now.

Rosie Sizer occupies the chief’s office. She demoted Grubbs as soon as she arrived, filling the position with another woman, Lynnae Berg. With allegations against Foxworth that he abused his authority to conduct the relationship with desk clerk Angela Oswalt and then keep it quiet, City Hall also has taken notice of potential gender-discrimination and harassment complaints.

“Now is the best time to come forward,” former Portland police Chief Penny Harrington said. “It sounds funny, I know, but it’s like there has never been a better time.”

Sizer declined to comment on Grubbs’ demotion.

Portland was the first city in the nation to hire a sworn, armed female cop with arrest authority, designating Lola Baldwin a “female detective” in 1908. Portland also was the first major American city to hire a female police chief Ñ Harrington, in 1985. Sizer is the third woman to lead the bureau, after Harrington and, on an interim status, Berg.

But as far as women have come in Portland law enforcement, symptoms exist that show those women they still have further to go. Lawsuits, equal-opportunity complaints, affidavits and depositions offer a snapshot of their concerns over the last decade.

Harassment. Discrimination. Fear of retribution.

Though not nearly as prevalent as in the decades before and immediately after Rita Sorenson became Portland’s first female patrol officer in 1973, allegations from female cops of disparate treatment continue.

Few current and former female Portland cops would agree to interviews, fewer still on the record. Of 994 sworn positions in the Police Bureau, 167 are held by women. The documents, in many cases and though they contain allegations as opposed to findings of fact, are the only way to hear their voices publicly.

One rookie officer, Pamela Frisby, said in a complaint to the state Bureau of Labor and Industries in 2002 that her training officer judged her more harshly than he did her male co-workers. According to the complaint, he also told her, “There are those in the bureau who believe that women and/or minorities do not belong in the bureau.” He further stated that it might not be right, but “that is the way it is.” She did not pass her probation period and was fired. BOLI closed her complaint with no substantial evidence found.

Another officer, Tracy Bertalot, with nine years’ experience, filed a BOLI complaint in 2003, alleging that a lieutenant asked her if she was “scared” to do police work, and that a sergeant “told me he would cut my tattoo off my wrist with his knife,” even though the sergeant did not remark on tattoos worn by male officers. That, too, was closed, with no substantial evidence found.

Judith Eckhart, a former detective, testified under oath in a deposition in 2003 that Grubbs, then a lieutenant in charge of investigating equal-employment-opportunity complaints, transferred her involuntarily to the Detective Division in 1997 because she was not part of the “good-old-boy network” and didn’t follow its unwritten rules.

“What reason did Stan Grubbs tell you you were being transferred?” Deputy City Attorney Jenifer Johnson asked Eckhart during the deposition.

“He said that I was desperately Ñ I remember he used the word ‘desperately’ Ñneeded on the detective floor,” Eckhart answered.

But Eckhart said she didn’t believe Grubbs and walked down to detectives and asked the captain why she was needed so urgently.

“And what did he say?” Johnson asked Eckhart.

“He said he had no idea what I was talking about, he had no place for me,” she answered.

Eckhart also sued the city in federal court in 1997, alleging a civil-rights violation based on gender discrimination. She settled out of court in 1999.

Grubbs did not return a phone call seeking comment.

After her deposition Ñ in a case brought against Grubbs by Detective Ann Friday, which was dismissed last year ÑEckhart testified in court that as a young officer in the 1980s, her traffic coach described lewd, graphically sexual acts as a quiz, asking Eckhart to “go through and pick through and tell him what crimes he was describing in detail,” according to the trial transcript.