PHOENIX (AP) - The city of Phoenix has tentatively agreed to settle a lawsuit alleging that a police officer stalked and made unwanted sexual advances toward a woman during an on-the-job encounter.
The amount of the settlement, which hasn’t yet been revealed, is expected to be publicly released in September when the City Council votes on the deal, which was revealed in court records Monday.
The lawsuit alleged Officer Marcos Rodriguez showed up at the woman’s apartment after an August 2018 encounter on a roadway, asked her several times if he could kiss her and made sexually suggestive comments and gestures. The officer also is accused of pointing a gun at her in a demonstration of how he would act if an attacker took away his gun.
In court records, the city denied the allegations.
The lawsuit said the encounter has caused the woman to take medications for depression, anxiety and insomnia and move out of her apartment so Rodriguez can’t find her.
It said Rodriguez abused his position of power for personal satisfaction and alleges civil rights violations, false imprisonment and invasion of privacy.
The Associated Press is not identifying her because it generally does not name people who may have been the victims of sexual assault or other abuse.
John Masterson, an attorney defending the city in the lawsuit, didn’t return calls seeking comment on the settlement. The police department deferred comment to the city’s law department, which didn’t immediately return a call Wednesday afternoon.
There was no residential phone listing for Rodriguez in the Phoenix area.
David Dow, one of the attorneys representing the woman who filed the lawsuit, declined to comment on the tentative settlement.
The police department didn’t answer a question from The Associated Press about the status of Rodriguez’s job. In mid-May, the Phoenix New Times reported that the agency confirmed that Rodriguez was on administrative leave and being examined in an internal affairs investigation.
The lawsuit said the woman first encountered Rodriguez as she left church and was headed to a grocery store. She claims the officer abruptly pulled onto a roadway as he was talking on a cellphone, causing her to swerve, according to the lawsuit.
She continued driving, but the officer pulled up next to her vehicle, signaled for her to roll down her window and apologized. She told the officer she was fine and tried to leave, but he motioned for her to pull over, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit said Rodriguez invited the woman to get coffee as a peace offering, but she declined. He later texted her and showed up at her apartment, uninvited, to apologize in person, so the woman let in the officer, according to the lawsuit.
Rodriguez told the woman they should be friends, asked her three times if he could kiss her, and made sexually suggestive comments and gestures. She declined his request to kiss her. Still, he told her he could instruct her on sex “as he’s the police and can do what he wants to her,” according to the lawsuit.
During the encounter, she pushed the officer’s chest away from her and told him he needed to leave. He then asked if she wanted to see one of his guns, which she declined, according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit said the officer then demonstrated to her how he would handle a person who would disarm him, putting his arm around her neck as he pointed the gun at her face and laughed.
After he left, Rodriguez sent the woman texts and said he went by her apartment, but he didn’t see her, according to the lawsuit.
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