“Every day was hell. You just keep saying, ‘I don’t deserve this. I didn’t do this,’ ” Richards, now 75, said in an interview with the Southern California News Group.

Indeed, the state Supreme Court agreed with Richards that he was wrongly convicted, blaming overzealous San Bernardino County sheriff’s investigators and prosecutors for botching the investigation into the murder of Richards’ wife, Pamela, who was killed in 1993 by someone who strangled her, beat her with rocks and crushed her skull with a concrete stepping-stone.

And last week, a federal court jury ordered the county to pay Richards $25.2 million for his wrongful conviction, which came after three prior criminal trials, one of which was declared a mistrial and two resulting in jury deadlocks.

While the verdict came as welcome news to Richards, who now lives in Lexington, Oklahoma, he remained conflicted in a telephone interview — reflecting on what he had lost in those 23 years in prison, how long it took for his vindication, and how much he suffered while incarcerated.

Every day in prison was one of guarded caution, Richards said. Other prisoners labeled him a “wife killer,” and he was always a target. “I gave some scars and I got some scars. It’s a rough place,” he said.

From the time of his arrest until he walked out of the West Valley Detention Center in Rancho Cucamonga in June 2016 a free man, Richards has always maintained his innocence.

David McLane, one of three attorneys at the Pasadena law firm McLane, Bednarski & Litt who represented Richards in his civil case, said he and attorneys Marilyn Bednarski and Ben Shaw convinced the jury during the weeklong civil trial that sheriff’s investigators conducted sloppy police work and did not allow a deputy coroner to examine Pamela Richards’ body for more than 11 hours while they processed the crime scene.

“That’s their policy to this day,” McLane said.

The delayed examination of Pamela Richards’ body resulted in the failure to firmly establish her approximate time of her death. And for the defense, that meant everything.

Richards clocked off work from his job as a mechanical engineer at Schuler Manufacturing in Corona at 11:03 p.m. on Aug. 10, 1993. He arrived home to the couple’s undeveloped 5-acre property in the Summit Valley area south of Hesperia about 11:50 p.m., shocked to discover his wife of 22 years dead.

Richards received a call from an acquaintance at 11:55 p.m. and then called 911 at 11:58 p.m. reporting his wife’s death. He called two more times before the first deputy arrived on scene at 12:38 a.m.

Investigators and prosecutors argued that Richards killed his 40-year-old wife sometime between the time he arrived home and the time he made his first 911 call.

McLane said exculpatory evidence that could have helped prove Richards’ innocence — such as a blond hair found under Pamela Richards’ fingernail that belonged to neither her nor her husband — was never presented to the defense during any of the criminal trials.

While Pamela Richards had blond hair at the time of her death, McLane said she bleached her hair and was naturally a brunette.

“This hair was blonde at the root. If that hair came from Pamela Richards, that hair should have been brown. And that evidence was suppressed from the defense,” said McLane, adding that DNA testing confirmed the hair strand belonged to an unknown third party.

DNA testing also revealed that hair and blood samples taken from a cinder block and concrete paver used to crush the victim’s skull was not that of either the victim nor her husband, court records show.

Additionally, a bite mark on Pamela Richards’ thumb, which prosecutors argued was inflicted by her husband, was not introduced as evidence until his final criminal trial resulting in his conviction. A prosecution expert testified that Richards’ teeth matched the bite mark, but then later admitted he was wrong. It was unclear if DNA testing was ever run on the bite mark to see if it matched that of Richards.

While McLane believes the county will appeal the verdict and attempt to get the jury award reduced, county spokesman David Wert said that decision will ultimately have to be approved by the Board of Supervisors.

“The Board of Supervisors will be advised of the verdict and decide what the next steps will be,” Wert said in an email on Tuesday, July 8.

District Attorney Jason Anderson declined to comment on the jury verdict.

Released from custody after 23 years, Richards found himself in a world unfamiliar to him — with no money, no family and no home.

“Everything I had was gone. All my friends died, all my family died,” Richards said. He wound up staying indefinitely with the family of an attorney for the California Innocence Project, which took up Richards’ case and helped in his fight for freedom.

Five years after his release, on June 18, 2021, a San Bernardino County Superior Court judge granted a motion filed by Richards’ attorney and declared him factually innocent. Since that qualified him for reparations from the California Victim Compensation Board, Richards filed a claim with the board. Two weeks later, he was granted more than $1.1 million.

Richards said the money allowed him to travel, purchase a home and vehicle, and settle down in Oklahoma. He has also remarried, and met his new wife, Marcella, while traveling in Hong Kong.

However, Richards now feels justice is complete with the recent jury award.

“I find it very satisfying,” he said. “After more than 30 years of this, I can pick up the pieces and move on.”

Adele Shirey, 45, alleges several Fourth Amendment rights violations against Deputy Martin Huizar in her federal lawsuit filed June 20 in U.S. District Court in Riverside, including unlawful entry, excessive force, battery and malicious prosecution. Shirey’s daughter, Destiny Shirey, who was present during her mother’s 2024 arrest at their former home in Winchester, also is a plaintiff in the lawsuit.

The heated confrontation was recorded on video and widely seen on social media.

Shirey, a day trader who is currently unemployed, was hosting a Fourth of July gathering at her home last year when Huizar, responding to a noise complaint, barged into the residence after a guest tried closing the front door on him, reportedly to go inform Shirey the deputy was outside, according to the lawsuit.

Huizar, however, blocked the guest from closing the door and forced his way inside, only to be confronted by a very agitated and dismayed Shirey. When she told Huizar to step outside, where she would talk to him, Huizar refused, according to the lawsuit. The interaction between the two escalated as Shirey repeatedly told Huizar to get out of her home.

“I am telling you, now that I am inside your house, I own your house,” Huizar told Shirey. When she told Huizar she knew her rights, he responded, “I don’t care if you know your rights.”

The altercation became so heated that Shirey told Huizar her dog “would bite him if she asked her to,” the suit alleges. When Shirey raised an arm and took a step toward Huizar, which the lawsuit states was done in exasperation, Huizar swiftly grabbed the woman and arrested her.

“Huizar grabbed her, slammed her against an inside wall, turned her around, pulled her outside the home, forced her against an outdoor wall, handcuffed her, and placed her under arrest,” according to the suit, which noted Shirey’s arrest occurred in front of her family and guests, and has caused emotional distress for her and her daughter.

Shirey said the encounter shook her trust in law enforcement.

“My family and I continue to be very traumatized based on what occurred in our home. I always had respect and trust for the police but now that trust has been broken and I live in fear of the police,” Shirey said in a statement Friday, June 27.

Shirey’s attorney, Dale K. Galipo, cited the situation’s lack of “exigent circumstances,” which are typically emergency situations where police intervention is needed for the safety or protection of people and property.

“Law enforcement cannot enter a home without a warrant or exigent circumstances, and none of that existed,” Galipo said in a telephone interview.

After Shirey was handcuffed and placed in the back of Huizar’s patrol car, he and several other deputies who responded as backup entered Shirey’s home again, without a warrant, and proceeded to “interrogate” her children and guests, according to the lawsuit.

The District Attorney’s Office charged Shirey with one misdemeanor count of resisting a peace officer on Aug. 13, 2024, but then dismissed the charge the following month “in the interest of justice,” an office spokesperson said.

A Sheriff’s Department spokesperson said Huizar is still employed by the department, but is no longer working patrol. He now works in court services.

Sheriff Chad Bianco declined to comment, citing the pending litigation.

Ramos admitted to the misconduct that the State Bar concluded was “an act of moral turpitude, dishonesty and corruption.” He also was ordered to pay $1,250 in monetary sanctions and $2,494 in investigation fees to the State Bar, which also placed Ramos on probation for two years, according to an order filed on March 20.

Ramos, 67, of Redlands, served as the district attorney from 2002 until he was defeated by Jason Anderson in the 2018 election. It followed a devastating loss in 2017 for both his office and the state Attorney General’s Office in a highly publicized public corruption case that saw all but one defendant vindicated.

From 2016 until 2020, Ramos deleted text messages from his personal cellphone and also deleted his campaign email account, both of which included communications regarding the nearly decadelong criminal investigation and prosecution of Rancho Cucamonga developer Jeff Burum and three former top county officials — all of whom were acquitted or had their charges dismissed in 2017.

Those text messages and emails were requested in a civil lawsuit filed in 2018 by Burum and his Colonies Partners investor group following Burum’s acquittal. Ramos, however, could not produce those records because they had been deleted.

U.S District Court Judge Jesus Bernal determined in April 2020 that Ramos had acted in bad faith and had a duty to preserve the electronic records sought by attorneys representing Burum and Colonies Partners.

The State Bar noted that Ramos was not advised by county counsel during the civil litigation to maintain his campaign email account.

“Respondent (Ramos) thereby unlawfully destroyed material having potential evidentiary value, ” according to the order, which also noted Bernal’s determination that Ramos asserting “ignorance of his obligation to preserve the ESI (electronically stored information) when he is a sophisticated party who had the assistance of experienced counsel was not persuasive.”

Ramos did not respond to repeated telephone calls and requests for comment.

Attorney Stephen G. Larson, who represented Burum in both the criminal trial and the civil case, said, “Given their power in our justice system, holding prosecutors accountable is the most important function of the State Bar in supporting the rule of law. In our highly politicized environment, it is essential that those who enforce the law be subject to the law.”

At the time of the $65 million settlement in November 2020, county spokesman David Wert said the settlement protected taxpayers from what could have been a more costly outcome. From 2006 to 2020, the county paid out $167 million to Colonies Partners to settle lawsuits the company had filed against the county.

The lengthy prosecution was launched in May 2011, when a grand jury indicted Burum, former county Supervisor Paul Biane, former Assistant Assessor Jim Erwin and Mark Kirk, a former chief of staff to former county Supervisor Gary Ovitt. Prosecutors charged Burum with conspiring with the other three defendants and former county Supervisor and Assessor Bill Postmus in a bribery scheme. That scheme, prosecutors alleged, influenced a $102 million settlement in 2006 between the county and Colonies Partners to settle a longstanding legal dispute over flood control easements at the Colonies’ residential and commercial development in Upland.

Burum, Biane, Erwin and Kirk maintained their innocence from the start and claimed the prosecution was politically motivated. Postmus, however, entered into a plea agreement with prosecutors two months before the other four defendants were indicted. He agreed to testify against the other defendants at trial and pleaded guilty in March 2011 to 15 felony charges in connection with the Colonies case and a companion case in which he was accused of corrupt practices while serving as county assessor. The charges included conspiracy to accept a bribe, conflict of interest, misappropriation of public funds and asking for and receiving bribes.

Postmus was sentenced to three years in state prison, but was released before serving his full term.

While the State Bar found Ramos to be “grossly negligent,” it took into account his nearly 30-year career as a county prosecutor and district attorney, with no prior record of discipline, and his service as president of the California District Attorneys Association Foundation, as a former board member of the Boys and Girls Clubs of Greater Redlands-Riverside, and as a volunteer board member for the California Crime Victims Alliance.

Since his election defeat in 2018, Ramos has taken up writing crime novels and now serves as an external relations director at UC Riverside’s Presley Center of Crime and Justice Studies. He also is an instructor at UCR’s School of Public Policy, said spokesman John Warren.

The findings came in the first compliance report issued by the Department of Justice since it entered into an agreement with the district in May 2024 following a 19-month civil rights investigation into years of failed responses to sexual misconduct.

The DOJ concluded the district was “substantially compliant” on 61 of the 63 state-mandated provisions of the agreement, but noted that from June 2024 to June 2025, 54% of 180 open complaints alleging student sexual harassment, assault or abuse remained unresolved and were past the 60-day investigation deadline.

The report, dated Wednesday, June 4, said the Office of Attorney General “continues to be seriously concerned with these 98 open cases that are unresolved as of May 19, 2025. While OAG recognizes that the District has made a concerted effort to promptly respond (to) and resolve complaints in an expeditious manner, the District is out of compliance with respect to the timeliness of resolutions.”

In June 2024, the Justice Department announced that Redlands Unified “systemically violated laws” in place to protect against and address complaints related to sexual assault, harassment and abuse, including Title IX, the Child Abuse and Neglect and Reporting Act and parts of the California Education Code.

To resolve the case, the Justice Department entered into a stipulated agreement compelling the district to implement “wide-ranging reforms” so that it could “promptly prevent, stop, and remedy sexual harassment, assault, or abuse on its campuses.” Under the agreement, the state will monitor the district for five years, and has provided a list of provisions for the district to meet, providing annual compliance reports to address the district’s progress and where it is falling short.

In a letter addressed to district staff on Thursday, June 5, Superintendent Juan Cabral noted Redlands Unified was found to be “substantially compliant” on nearly all of the DOJ’s markers, but added that it “faced challenges in resolving a high volume of formal complaints.”

“We understand that each case represents a student or family navigating a difficult experience,” Cabral said in the letter. “We are working diligently to ensure that responses are timely, thorough, and respectful of all individuals involved.”

In the past year, the district has taken steps to expand staffing and training, adopt new policies and engage the community to comply with the terms of its agreement with the state. According to the Justice Department and Cabral’s letter to staff, the district has, among other things:

• Appointed an assistant superintendent of compliance and a Title IX coordinator.
• Updated and adopted new policies on sexual harassment prevention, staff conduct, and student safety.
• Trained staff on investigation procedures, including special considerations and legal obligations for students with disabilities.
• Launched a districtwide tracking system that gives students and families easier access to file reports and track their complaints.
• Created a system to ensure that substitute teachers with substantiated complaints against them were not rehired.
• Provided training for students, staff and families on their rights and responsibilities, and created age-appropriate Title IX videos for students across all grade levels.

Title IX is a federal law enacted in 1972 that protects individuals from discrimination based on sex in education programs or activities that receive federal financial assistance.

The Justice Department noted the district tasked the new assistant superintendent of compliance with monitoring and analyzing any trends in complaints received, informing the superintendent of them, and directing staff to take appropriate corrective action in response.

Now, the district will move forward to address its deficiencies noted in the state’s compliance report.

Cabral said the district is expanding its compliance team and refining its investigative processes to ensure all cases are resolved “promptly, fairly, and with appropriate documentation and follow-up.”

In the coming year, the superintendent said, the district will:

• Add investigators and support staff to reduce case backlogs.
• Improve how the district follows through on every report, from initial filing to resolution.
• Conduct more community outreach so families know how to report concerns and what to expect in return.
• Monitor progress through surveys, advisory meetings, and public updates.

Since 2016, Redlands Unified has paid more than $41.3 million to settle sexual abuse lawsuits against the district and former teachers, several of whom have been convicted and sentenced to jail or prison.

Attorney Morgan Stewart, who has represented former Redlands Unified students in the bulk of the sexual abuse lawsuits settled over the last decade, was traveling out of the country and said Friday he had not yet reviewed the compliance order.

On May 20, Stewart’s Irvine law firm, Manly, Stewart, & Finaldi, announced it had filed a lawsuit against the district on behalf of another alleged victim of former Citrus Valley High School teacher Laura Whitehurst. The lawsuit alleges Whitehurst had a sexual relationship with a 16-year-old male student at Redlands High School from 2007 through 2008, when she taught at the school, according to a news release. The release also noted that police reports indicate complaints about Whitehurst molesting minors began soon after she was hired by the district in 2006 and continued until the time of her arrest in 2013.

Whitehurst was convicted in August 2018 of having unlawful sex with three students, including one of her students at Citrus Valley High School whose child she bore.

Stewart has referred to Redlands Unified as the “poster child” for student sexual abuse, noting that more than 20 teachers and administrators have been accused of inappropriate sexual behavior with their students over the last 10 years.

A two-year investigation, started in 2018 by the Southern California News Group, found that Redlands Unified, for decades, frequently failed to report to authorities teachers and other employees accused of grooming and sexually abusing students. The investigation also showed that, in some cases, district officials thwarted police investigations of sexual abuse cases.

The Justice Department released findings from its investigation a month after the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights sent a damning 20-page letter to Cabral with its findings from a four-year investigation, which concluded that the district, among other things, failed to respond properly to 74% of 35 reports of sexual abuse against students from 2017 to 2020.

Sabine Robertson-Phillips, the district’s assistant superintendent of human resources and a central figure in the district’s sex abuse scandal, was placed on paid leave the day the OCR released its report and has remained on leave ever since. In April, the school board unanimously approved her resignation and a settlement agreement, under which she will remain on leave until she officially resigns and retires effective Sept. 1.

Hochman was standing in Claremont, at the L.A./San Bernardino county line, when he remarked that the border was something “criminals used to look forward to when they entered L.A. County because the laws weren’t being enforced as much as they were in San Bernardino County.”

“I’ve got a rude awakening for those criminals. We’re back!” he said. “The DA’s office is working with law enforcement and we’re going to actually enforce the laws and hold criminals accountable.”

Intended as a swipe at his predecessor, former one-term District Attorney George Gascon, who was perceived as soft on crime, Hochman’s comments instead were interpreted by some as tone deaf and, in the words of one critic, “a cheap shot.”

Feeds into ‘old stereotype’

That critic, Steve Lambert, a partner at the Upland-based public affairs firm The 20/20 Network, also branded Hochman’s comments “flat-out wrong.”

“If his point is that he’s tough on crime, he shouldn’t be using San Bernardino County and the Inland Empire as a prop, and that’s what he did,” Lambert said. “The inference of everything he’s saying is that the criminals are coming from elsewhere. It just feeds into that old stereotype of San Bernardino County being a source of crime for the region.”

In reality, Lambert said, the county has experienced tremendous growth in economic development and housing construction since the turn of the century. The Southern California Association of Governments projects a million people will be moving into San Bernardino County by 2050 for more affordable housing and better employment opportunities, he said.

And, as Hochman acknowledged, the region is attacking crime.

“So for him to lay out that old stereotype of our region is more than offensive; it counteracts all the great work that’s been done here. He’s got to be better than that,” Lambert said.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Nathan Hochman, LA County District Attorney (@nathanhochmanda)

Paul C. Granillo, president and CEO of the Inland Empire Economic Partnership, said he, too, was frustrated by Hochman’s comments. Granillo said he received a spate of text messages and phone calls from community leaders Thursday about the Instagram post as word rapidly spread through the community.

“The implication is that people from San Bernardino County were coming to L.A. and committing crimes, and that’s a bold stereotype,” said Granillo, whose Rancho Cucamonga-based organization promotes community members, local businesses and local government working together to build a stronger economy and quality of life in the Inland Empire.

“We need to be working together on issues around crime and not pointing fingers. But I am happy that the DA recognizes the good work of our sheriff and police departments,” he said.

Granillo said he also understands the intent behind Hochman’s message — that he was touting his tough-on-crime stance as a major about-face in his office — but feels the execution was poor.

“I voted for him,” Granillo said. “It’s not that I’m not supportive of what he’s doing, but unfortunately the message missed the mark.”

Mayor ‘dumbfounded’

Fontana Mayor Acquanetta Warren said she was was sent a link to Hochman’s post by a friend, a retired probation officer living in Los Angeles.

“He said, ‘Did you see this mess?’ ” said Warren, who has served as Fontana’s mayor for the past 15 years.

“I was like, ‘Where are you going with this, dude? You’ve got enough trouble over there,’ ” Warren said in a telephone interview.

When she viewed it, Warren said, she was “dumbfounded.”

She said she understands Hochman’s intended message, but thought it was poorly delivered and had unintended consequences.

“I think professionalism will prevail, but this guy has some catching up to do,” Warren said of Hochman, who deposed Gascon in the November election.

Hochman apologizes

In a phone interview with the Southern California News Group, Hochman apologized to anyone who took offense at his post. He said he certainly didn’t intend to cast stones at San Bernardino County.

“I wanted people to understand that L.A. County was going to join San Bernardino County in holding criminals accountable,” Hochman said. He praised San Bernardino County District Attorney Jason Anderson and the work his prosecutors have been doing over the years to hold criminals accountable.

He said his inspiration for the social media post was a 2024 billboard campaign by the Orange County district attorney’s office during a spate of smash-and-grab robberies and commercial burglaries in the county. “Crime doesn’t pay in Orange County,” proclaimed the billboards. “If you steal, we prosecute.”

Again, the message was targeted at criminals from surrounding counties who perhaps weren’t aware of Orange County’s tough-on-crime reputation. The OC district attorney’s office concluded that from August 2022 to May 2023, only one of 141 defendants criminally charged for smash-and-grabs, residential burglaries and commercial burglaries actually resided in Orange County.

Similarly, Hochman said he wanted “to make it clear that criminals cannot come from other counties and get a free pass” in L.A. County.

But unlike in Orange County, Hochman said his data was anecdotal, based on conversations he had with Los Angeles police officers and sheriff’s deputies who informed him that a number of people arrested for crimes in L.A. County during Gascon’s tenure had addresses in San Bernardino County.

“They were moving from San Bernardino County, where the DA was holding them accountable, into Los Angeles County, where the DA wasn’t holding them accountable,” Hochman said. “And so, effectively, what I was trying to do was praise both the San Bernardino County DA’s office and the Orange County DA’s office in the sense they are holding criminals accountable, and making it clear if people cross the borders into L.A. County, we will hold them accountable.”

DA, sheriff not offended

Anderson, the San Bernardino County district attorney, said he was not among those offended by Hochman.

“I think it was a way for him to get his name out there and say he was taking a different approach in his county. Several other people in my office also saw it and weren’t offended at all,” Anderson said. “The way I took it was as a comparison of the idea that people got away with things in L.A. County because of the previous administration. I think he (Hochman) was saying there was a change in policy.”

Anderson said he could understand how some could take offense to the post, and believes any perception of San Bernardino County as a haven for criminals is seriously flawed.

“I don’t see San Bernardino County as a boiling cauldron of criminals. If somebody thought there was a bunch of crooks in San Bernardino County hopping over the county line to commit crimes, I don’t see it that way,” Anderson said. “When you look at a lot of our cities — Rancho Cucamonga, Ontario, Upland, Redlands and even cities in the High Desert — given the population increase, the crime rate per capita is relatively low in San Bernardino County.”

San Bernardino County Sheriff Shannon Dicus said his department, in cooperation with the District Attorney’s Office and federal partners, has been aggressively tackling violent crime. In a statement, he said they have “led from the front” in the fight against organized crime, gun violence and “intimidation campaigns that masquerade as activism while profiting off threats and chaos.”

Dicus also said he values the strong working relationships with his counterparts in Los Angeles County: Sheriff Robert Luna, Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonnell and, now, District Attorney Hochman.

Like Anderson, Dicus was not offended by Hochman’s Instagram post.

“Los Angeles County voters sent a clear message in the last election. They were fed up with years of policies that emboldened offenders and left victims behind,” Dicus said. “With District Attorney Nathan Hochman’s election (and) passage of Prop. 36 with 68 percent of the vote, Los Angeles has an opportunity to reset.

“I appreciate his efforts to restore trust in the rule of law, and I look forward to working with him directly — especially on cross-county cases that require swift, coordinated enforcement.”

Editor’s note: This article has been updated with comments from San Bernardino County Sheriff Shannon Dicus. 

The allegations were contained in a complaint by whistleblower Sarah Dunbar-Riley, a Nutrition Services supervisor, to interim Superintendent Judy White after the district reopened an investigation that originally was launched in 2023 but then abruptly halted.

In her four-page statement to White dated March 19, Dunbar-Riley alleges Nutrition Services Lead Agent Fausat Rahman-Davies repeatedly misused government food commodities and district central kitchen supplies. She also implicated Assistant Agent Maria Rangel and former Program Innovator Kristina Kraushaar in the activities.

Rahman-Davies “regularly loaded her van — or Kristina Kraushaar, and Maria Rangel’s vehicles — with large quantities of fresh produce, baked goods, and other over-ordered items to donate to her mosque and personal home supply,” Dunbar-Riley said in her statement, a copy of which was obtained by the Southern California News Group.

Dunbar-Riley alleged that Rahman-Davies engaged in the conduct on a weekly basis for at least five years — from the time she was appointed lead agent in 2019 through 2024.

Excess food restrictions

Government food commodities from the U.S. Department of Agriculture support student lunch and breakfast, summer meal, after-school snack and supper programs at school districts across the nation, according to the California Department of Education. Over-ordered food cannot be used for fundraisers, community events or a la carte sales, nor can it be given away to employees, friends or family members.

However, it can be transferred to other schools and districts for use. Unused food also can be donated to other organizations, including food banks, pantries and homeless shelters, under certain safety guidelines. In worst-case scenarios, when the food cannot be used or reallocated or is spoiled, it must be disposed of or destroyed according to state and federal guidelines.

Officials with the California School Nutrition Association did not respond to repeated requests for comment.

Drive-up service

Dunbar-Riley and other Nutrition Services employees who spoke to the Southern California News Group on condition of anonymity due to fear of reprisal said that, on multiple occasions, they saw boxes of food carted out of the central kitchen warehouse on dollies and into the parking lot, where warehouse workers and other employees — at the instruction of Rahman-Davies, Kraushaar or Rangel — would load the food into personal vehicles.

Among the regulars who showed up for food, they said, was Maria Montes Torres, mother of school board member Edgar Montes and a former Nutrition Services employee who resigned on April 16 following a Southern California News Group inquiry about her son voting to hire her as a part-time cafeteria worker in August 2022, a violation of the board’s conflict of interest bylaws.

In her statement, Dunbar-Riley said Rangel would call Montes Torres often to come pick up food, citing specific dates of Aug. 25 and Sept. 28 of 2020 as examples.

Edgar Montes did not respond to a request for comment.

Dunbar-Riley also alleges another school board member was among those showing up often at the central kitchen to pick up food.

“Board member Evelyn Dominguez had her car loaded with food on multiple occasions; one occurrence was on April 28th, 2023,” Dunbar-Riley said in her statement.

Dominguez declined to comment.

Food routinely over-ordered

One Nutrition Services employee of 15 years said Rangel and Kraushaar would regularly instruct employees to prepare boxes of fresh produce and other government-issued food to give away to people who clearly were not supposed to be receiving it.

“The difference was the people in the suits and ties. You could tell they were people that didn’t need the food,” the employee said, adding that the conduct never occurred when Cindy Stone, Rahman-Davies’ predecessor, headed the department. “Ever since she (Rahman-Davies) started, that’s when it all started,” the employee said.

The employee said food was consistently over-ordered by Rahman-Davies, Kraushaar and Rangel — to the tune of about $30,000 a month, leaving the district with so much unused food that much of it was thrown away.

“We would trash pallets of apples, oranges, all kinds of mixed fruit. We threw so much food away,” said the employee, who believes food was over-ordered to bolster the amount of funding the department would receive annually from state and federal programs.

Dunbar-Riley said over-ordered food also was used at special events for which it was not intended, including annual Black History Month celebrations hosted by Nutrition Services, food pantry giveaways, and a district literacy and numeracy fair in 2023.

Another Nutrition Services employee also attested to seeing Rahman-Davies and Rangel loading food into their van or SUV on multiple occasions and thought it odd, given the department has its own vans to transport food.

“I’m like, ‘What are they doing? Where are they going? It’s government food. Why would they be putting it into their own car?’ ” the employee said. “That shouldn’t be done. It was a red flag.”

The employee also said that, on multiple occasions, Rahman-Davies’ sister also benefited from excess food.

“She would sit with Fausat in her office and, after a few minutes, there would be boxes of food waiting for her that were loaded into her car,” the employee said.

Rahman-Davies and Krausher did not respond to repeated requests for comment. Reached by telephone, Rangel declined to comment.

Initial probe halted

Dunbar-Riley’s allegations surfaced during an investigation by the Southern California News Group into the Nutrition Services department that began in December 2024. White, the interim superintendent, confirmed in early March — about a week after the school board appointed her to the temporary post — that she reopened an investigation into the alleged inflation of student meal counts that was paused last year shortly after Superintendent Cuauhtemoc Avila was abruptly placed on leave on May 8, 2024.

Ten months later, Avila was fired without cause amid sexual harassment allegations against him that he claims were trumped up.

White placed Rahman-Davies and Rangel on paid administrative leave when she revived the investigation. Kraushaar left the district in February to take a job as food services director for the Chaffey Joint Union High School District.

No criminal charges have been filed in connection with the allegations, and, thus far, there is no indication that any outside authorities are investigating them.

However, Rialto Unified spokesperson Syeda Jafri confirmed that the district is conducting a forensic audit of the meal inflation allegations as well as investigating complaints about employee mistreatment in the Nutrition Services department and “all allegations of misappropriation of food.”

The Southern California News Group has learned the allegations first surfaced in the summer of 2023, and were under investigation by a forensics auditor hired by former Superintendent Cuauhtemoc Avila when the schools chief was abruptly placed on leave by the Board of Education and the probe was “paused,” district officials said.

Ten months later, Avila was terminated without cause amid sexual harassment allegations against him that he claims were trumped up.

He was replaced on Feb. 27 when the board appointed Judy White as interim superintendent. The following week, White reopened the internal probe and placed Nutrition Services Lead Agent Fausat Rahman-Davies and Assistant Agent Maria Rangel on paid administrative leave.

“Transparency and restoring trust are important in order to move forward,” Rialto Unified spokesperson Syeda Jafri said. “The district has no further comments referencing personnel matters.”

Top supervisors named

The shakeup comes amid a five-month investigation by the Southern California News Group into allegations of corruption by school board members and top-level managers and administrators in Rialto Unified.

At the outset of the district’s reopened investigation, Nutrition Services supervisor Sarah Dunbar-Riley submitted a four-page statement to White and the Personnel Services department on March 19 summarizing the data falsification allegations she had first reported in mid-2023.

She also outlined misconduct allegations against Rahman-Davies, Rangel and Kristina Kraushaar, the district’s former program innovator for Nutrition Services who at the time was Dunbar-Riley’s supervisor. Kraushaar left the district in February to take a job as food service director for Chaffey Joint Union High School District in Ontario.

“During this investigation, multiple employees and I reported the falsification of student meal reimbursements, where meal counts were intentionally inflated to receive additional federal funds,” Dunbar-Riley said in her statement, a copy of which was obtained by the Southern California News Group.

She named six district employees who brought the matter to her attention during the outset of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as several school cafeteria managers and other employees who worked at food distribution sites.

With schools closed, cafeteria workers prepared student meals daily that were provided to parents at designated drive-thru locations via the district’s “Grab and Go” program, Jafri said. Dunbar-Riley and more than a half-dozen current and former Nutrition Services employees, who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal, said numbers also were inflated for meals served during the district’s Summer Meals Program and BBQ events.

How number inflation worked

Based on interviews with Dunbar-Riley and other current and former Nutrition Services employees, this is how the meal records allegedly were manipulated:

Cafeteria managers at each school, referred to as site leads, would log the number of meals served each day on daily forms and enter the data into the district’s eTrition software program. The forms containing the previous week’s meal counts from each school were placed in envelopes, and, every Tuesday morning, a courier would pick them up, deposit them into a burgundy courier bag and deliver the records to the central kitchen office.

There, Dunbar-Riley and other supervisors would input the data from each school into a spreadsheet and, at the end of each month, submit them up the chain to top department managers. It was there where Dunbar-Riley and other nutrition workers believe the numbers were inflated before they were sent off to the state for reimbursement.

As a matter of due diligence, cafeteria managers often would log into eTrition to reconcile their meal count numbers from previous weeks, which is when they started noticing the number alterations, Dunbar-Riley said.

“When one high school cafeteria manager questioned Rangel about why the eTrition numbers did not match the numbers she initially submitted, Rangel dismissed her concerns, ‘laughing it off’ and saying that site leads were not responsible for entering meal counts,” Dunbar-Riley said in her statement.

And when Dunbar-Riley broached the subject with Rangel, she said Rangel told her it was none of her concern.

One former employee of 25 years, who worked as a site lead at two schools, said she began noticing the inflated meal count numbers either in late 2020 or early 2021.

After filling out her paperwork every Sunday at home, she said, one of her first orders of business Monday morning was logging into eTrition to reconcile her meal count numbers from the previous week to ensure they matched. They didn’t.

“It was like triple the numbers. My numbers never matched,” she said. “I would call Maria Rangel and say my paperwork doesn’t match with the numbers you have, and she said, ‘Don’t worry about it.’ ”

Another Nutrition Services worker of 23 years said she first noticed the number changing in December 2020.

On Dec. 10, 2020, for example, she said she logged 782 total meals served, but the eTrition system showed 999 meals, an increase of more than 200. “I said, ‘Wow, this doesn’t look right. These aren’t the numbers I put in,’ ” she said.

So, out of curiosity, she checked her meal count numbers for another day: Dec. 8, 2020. Her paperwork indicated she submitted a count of 696 total meals served that day, but the number in eTrition showed 1,016, an increase of nearly 46%.

“That’s a lot of meals I didn’t serve,” she said. When she called Rangel about the discrepancy, “She just laughed. I just said, ‘OK, got it!’ I figured we just shouldn’t question them. I interpreted it as, ‘don’t ask!’ so I didn’t ask.”

In her statement to the school district, Dunbar-Riley’s said, “This fraudulent activity continued through the summer of 2023, and possibly beyond, with student meal counts at various school sites inflated — often by hundreds of meals per site.”

Rahman-Davies, who has worked for the district’s Nutrition Services department for 30 years and earns a base salary of $208,000 as its lead agent, did not respond to repeated requests for an interview. Rangel, who has worked at the district for more than 35 years, declined to comment when reached by telephone. Kraushaar declined repeated requests for comment.

Millions of dollars?

During the pandemic, the state reimbursed school districts an average of $1.89 for every breakfast and $3.64 for every lunch served to students qualifying for free or reduced-price meals. After-school snacks were reimbursed at an average rate of 76 cents each, according to state Department of Education data.

Dunbar-Riley said that in June 2023, the combined daily breakfast and lunch counts at one high school were inflated by more than 12,000, making the school eligible for about $48,000 in additional reimbursement from the state and federal governments for that month alone.

And that was at just one of the district’s four high schools. There also were five middle schools and 19 elementary schools where meal count numbers were suspected of being inflated during the pandemic and possibly beyond, Dunbar-Riley said.

“It equated to possibly millions of dollars in additional reimbursement due to the inflated numbers,” Dunbar-Riley said.

Both the state and the U.S. Department of Agriculture provide the funding to reimburse school districts through their respective child nutrition programs, said Carrie Bogdanovich, former president of the California School Nutrition Association.

No criminal charges have been filed in connection with the allegations and there is no indication yet that federal or state authorities plan to investigate them.

Employee mistreatment

Initially, Dunbar-Riley complained to the district in June 2023 solely about employee mistreatment in the Nutrition Services department. It was not until Rialto Unified opened an investigation into those complaints a month later did she bring up the alleged data falsification.

Dunbar-Riley and other current and former employees said Rahman-Davies — supported by Kraushaar and Rangel — frequently subjected Nutrition Services workers to harassment, belittlement and threats of being written up or fired. One 15-year district employee said the open hostility exhibited by Rahman-Davies and Kraushaar had a chilling effect on the workforce.

“Everyone was afraid of Fausat and Kristina, because of the way they would belittle everyone. A lot of people got moved to other places. They’d force you to quit,” the employee said.

Dunbar-Riley said she had enjoyed a relationship with Rahman-Davies that was “like mother and daughter,” until she started questioning things — from employee mistreatment and discipline to the meal count inconsistencies. That’s when things became frosty, not only with Rahman-Davies, but with Kraushaar and Rangel as well.

“I started standing up for people who were being mistreated, as well as myself. I started fighting back,” Dunbar-Riley said. “I went against them and what they wanted. And I started getting written up and disciplined.”

Dunbar-Riley said she was called a “traitor” by Rahman-Davies in front of other supervisors and administrators.

On one occasion, according to her statement, Dunbar-Riley was sitting at her desk outside Rahman-Davies’ office when she overheard her tell Kraushaar and Rangel that she could not work with her and called her a traitor. And during a business meeting in July 2024, Rahman-Davies told risk manager Derek Harris, in front of two other supervisors, she “does not sit next to traitors” when Harris offered her a seat next to Dunbar-Riley, according to the statement.

Asked what took her so long to report what was going on and to go public, Dunbar-Riley said she felt stuck. Rahman-Davies was insulated, she believed, and she would only be causing herself, and other Nutrition Services employees, more harm.

“I was terrified. You don’t know how much you can get caught up in it, because we all knew about it,” she said. “I had to get to the point where I wasn’t scared.”

Dunbar-Riley said she doesn’t have a lawyer and has no plans to sue the district or her supervisors. Like many of her colleagues in Nutrition Services, Dunbar-Riley said she wants only one thing.

“I want it to stop — the harassment, the retaliation, the fraud,” she said. “I needed to take a stand.”

Reassigned from her job

When the district began investigating Dunbar-Riley’s harassment complaints against Rahman-Davies, Kraushaar and Rangel, she said, she provided its investigator, attorney Beverly Ozowara, a list of more than 60 employees who could corroborate her complaints and/or had grievances of their own. Early on in the probe, she also brought up the meal count inflation.

An April 24, 2024, findings report on the investigation, obtained by the Southern California News Group, revealed Ozowara viewed those allegations as outside the scope of the harassment investigation and referred them to the Personnel Services department.

While the report noted that Rahman-Davies and Kraushaar did engage in unprofessional behavior toward employees and, at times, “critiqued” Dunbar-Riley in front of her colleagues, it did not find that Rahman-Davies, Kraushaar or Rangel harassed, demeaned or retaliated against her.

However, Rialto Unified has confirmed it is reexamining the harassment allegations as part of its ongoing investigation.

The report also noted Dunbar-Riley’s record of discipline for performance deficiencies, including untimely completion of performance evaluations for other employees, untimely and incorrect submissions of food menus for school sites, and failure to properly oversee the budget and food order for a special event at Eisenhower High School.

Before the investigation was completed, Dunbar-Riley said, she was removed from Nutrition Services and reassigned in January 2024 to work in risk management and transportation services, where she has remained since. In her new role, she said, she has been restricted from communicating with any nutrition staff member and from entering the central kitchen facilities without an escort or prior approval.

“This effectively isolated me from my department and prohibited me from speaking to Nutrition Services staff,” she said.

First hints of turmoil

While the allegations about Nutrition Services have been percolating mostly behind closed doors at Rialto Unified district headquarters for the past two years, hints of the turmoil have occasionally bubbled up publicly — at school board meetings and in various legal claims — but often without context.

The first sign came in May 2024, when a split school board placed Superintendent Avila on administrative leave without explanation. A week later, an interim superintendent — lead academic agent Ed D’Souza — was appointed to replace him on a 3-0 vote, again without explanation, to a confused audience.

“We know that many of you will have many questions,” board member Edgar Montes said from the dais. “This action, however, is a confidential personnel matter.”

Six months later, with Avila still on paid leave, he filed a damage claim that revealed, for the first time, the district was investigating sexual harassment allegations against him involving a Rialto Unified employee. Avila claimed Montes was behind the accusation by the district’s lead agent of innovation, Patricia Chavez, and asserted that the allegation was fabricated.

In his claim, Avila also alleged that Montes had directed him to intervene in an open investigation of district personnel who were supportive of the school board member. Avila declined at the time to elaborate, but months later he would confirm that it was the Nutrition Services investigation.

Avila, Dunbar-Riley and other district and Nutrition Services employees said it was common knowledge that Montes and Rahman-Davies were friends, and that Montes has long championed and lauded the Nutrition Services department.

Among Avila’s complaints in his claim was that Montes wanted him to hire family and/or friends of his, even if they were unqualified and did not meet hiring requirements.

In April, the Southern California News Group revealed that Montes had voted in 2023 to hire his mother as a part-time cafeteria worker in violation of board bylaws. He claimed the vote was “inadvertent” — he didn’t notice her name on agenda materials listing new hires. After Maria Montes Torres resigned her position, SCNG revealed that Montes also had voted in 2022 to hire his mother as a substitute cafeteria worker.

Avila speaks out

Speaking out publicly for the first time in nearly a year, Avila confirmed to the Southern California News Group that Montes repeatedly pressured him to shut down the Nutrition Services investigation, from around the fall of 2023 until Avila was placed on leave in May 2024.

As the harassment investigation was wrapping up in the spring of 2024, Montes insisted that no discipline be meted out to Rahman-Davies, Rangel or Kraushaar, Avila claimed.

As to the data falsification investigation, Montes was even more adamant that it be shut down, Avila said.

Things became heated between the two immediately following a school board meeting in April 2024, when Montes and a board ally, Evelyn Dominguez, met with the superintendent in his office for about an hour, Avila said.

“Edgar walked around the office slamming his hand on the conference room table saying, ‘This is a witch hunt and b.s. investigation.’ Then Dominguez chimed in and said, ‘Yeah, this is a b.s. investigation,’ ” Avila said. “I kept my composure, as I was used to his explosive confrontations, and I did not agree to shut down the investigation.”

Avila said Montes then asked him if he “would like to be investigated”? In response, Avila said he chuckled and said, “Go ahead.”

Dominguez declined to comment. Montes did not respond to requests for comment.

Less than a month later, on May 8, 2024, Avila’s nine-year tenure at the helm of Rialto Unified began to unravel when he was placed on leave for reasons not revealed to the public.

Retired Cpl. Chad Jensen, 58, received $525,000 and retired Sgt. Michael Neaderbaomer, 57, received $725,000. Their lawyers received $1.2 million for their fees and other legal costs, according to the settlement agreement ratified April 16.

Jensen and Neaderbaomer were among several officers who became embroiled in a highly publicized police brutality and corruption case in 2015.

In their lawsuit, filed in May 2020, they claimed that now retired Police Chief Michael Olivieri retaliated by restricting them from official police work, including patrol duty and participating in investigations. Instead, he forced them to perform manual labor and menial housekeeping duties, including taking out the trash, moving furniture and cleaning offices.

Upon their reinstatement, Olivieri told Jensen and Neaderbaomer it was too soon to assign them to law enforcement duties given the negative publicity surrounding their cases and a pending internal affairs investigation, according to the lawsuit, He told them he did not want them interacting with the public because he didn’t want to be questioned as to why both were back at work, the lawsuit stated.

“My clients are grateful that justice prevailed after 5 years of litigating their mistreatment by the city of Pomona,” said Daniel Moussatche, the attorney for the two former officers, in a statement. “The rights of these officers were ultimately vindicated after the city literally spent millions to deny them their rights. The city’s own investigation showed they did nothing wrong, and there was never a reason to violate their rights and destroy their careers.”

Jensen, Neaderbaomer and Officer Prince Taylor Hutchinson were indicted in October 2017 on federal civil rights charges in connection with the assault of 16-year-old Christian Aguilar at the Pomona Fairplex and the attempted cover-up of the incident. Jensen was accused of the assault, and he and Hutchinson, his partner at the time, also were accused of preparing false reports that attempted to justify the use of force.

Additionally, Neaderbaomer was accused of making false statements to Aguilar and his family in an attempt to dissuade them from reporting the incident to law enforcement.

Aguilar filed a civil lawsuit against the city in connection with the encounter and later settled it for $500,000.

Jensen and Hutchinson, who were involved in the actual confrontation with Aguilar, were tried separately from Neaderbaomer. Their first trial ended with jurors deadlocked 11-1 in favor of guilt on all counts, but they were both acquitted in a retrial.

At Neaderbaomer’s trial in April 2019, a jury acquitted him of the charge of making false accusations to Aguilar and his family, and the government subsequently dropped two remaining charges of lying to the FBI.

Jensen retired in May 2021 and Neaderbaomer in August 2022. Hutchinson also was reinstated and remains on duty at the department, where he now holds the rank of detective, Pomona Assistant City Manager Mark J. Gluba said.

The civil case was scheduled to go to trial on April 14, but in a March 17 ruling Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Bradley S. Phillips granted a request by Moussatche to exclude certain evidence key to the city’s defense, including video footage and photographs taken by bystanders during the 2015 encounter at the Fairplex. Phillips also determined that evidence from Jensen’s and Neaderbaomer’s criminal trials was inadmissible in that it could prejudice and potentially confuse and/or mislead jurors.

In an email, Gluba said settling a case of such magnitude was a “very complex matter.” The mayor and City Council had a duty to protect taxpayer dollars, he said, and their decision to settle the case reflected that responsibility.

“It is the city’s position that there was no wrongdoing on our behalf in this matter. Court cases involve risk and are expensive to litigate,” Gluba said. “More importantly, in this case the trial judge issued certain pretrial rulings that stripped the city of its main defense and made going to trial extremely risky.”

In a ruling Nov. 25 that was disclosed last week by the Sheriff’s Department, U.S. District Court Judge Jesus G. Bernal dismissed, with prejudice, a wrongful death lawsuit filed initially in August 2021 in Riverside by the father of 24-year-old Chino Hills resident Casandra Pastora.

Bernal concluded that Deputies Ariel Szulc and Christina Dominguez adhered to proper procedures in the care and monitoring of Pastora, who was declared brain dead and removed from a ventilator on March 22, 2021, at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Fontana.

Dominguez discovered Pastora lying face-down on her mattress in her cell at 10:37 a.m. on March 15, 2021, her fist in her mouth, which Pastora used to try to suffocate herself, according to Bernal’s ruling. A jail nurse managed to resuscitate Pastora and get a pulse, and she was taken to Kaiser Fontana, where she died a week later.

The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department announced Bernal’s ruling on April 30, saying it was satisfied with the court’s decision and insisted that, in this case, it “acted promptly, followed established protocols, and provided immediate access to medical and mental health services.”

“The loss of a life is always devastating, no matter the circumstances. However, I feel it is important that we keep the public informed of the outcome of these lawsuits so they know the original one-sided story presented by some media outlets doesn’t always include all the facts,” San Bernardino County Sheriff Shannon Dicus said in a statement Friday.

“It seems only the lawsuits that are lost by the department are the ones publicized and rarely do the ones that are won get reported on. It is my priority to minimize any taxpayer funds being spent on lawsuits that have no basis of wrongdoing on behalf of the department.”

Pastora’s father, Saeed “Sam” Toghraie, alleged in his lawsuit civil rights violations, including inadequate conditions of confinement and denial of needed medical care for his daughter, who was pregnant. He named former Sheriff John McMahon, Dicus and Capt. Victor Moreno as the main defendants. Dominguez and Szulc also were named as defendants, according to Bernal’s ruling.

Pastora was arrested at the Whistler Court home she shared with her father and booked into the jail on March 13, 2021, after her father called 911 reporting his daughter had attacked him and a neighbor. Toghraie claims his daughter suffered a psychotic episode after she stopped taking her medication to treat her schizophrenia because she was concerned it would harm her unborn child.

Pastora, according to her father, was 14 weeks’ pregnant when she was arrested, and lost her child due to her self-inflicted injuries while at the jail.

During the three days Pastora was at the jail, she was taken to Arrowhead Regional Medical Center in Colton on March 14 due to a self-inflicted head injury from banging her head on her cell door window. She returned to the jail later that day, and the following morning was observed by Dominguez, Szulc, and medical and mental health staff at the jail making sounds that led them to believe Pastora was vomiting. Dominguez suspected it was morning sickness, according to Bernal’s ruling.

Jail officials also tried doing a rape kit and conducting a psychiatric assessment on Pastora, but said they were unsuccessful because she appeared to be vomiting. At 10:24 a.m., Szulc offered Pastora food, but she refused it. Thirteen minutes later, she was discovered lying face down on her mattress.

Her cause of death was listed as anoxic encephalopathy due to Pastora obstructing her airway with her hand, according to Bernal’s ruling.

“Assuming there was a duty to protect Pastora against suffocating herself with her own fist, it does not appear that any defendant breached that duty,” Bernal said. “The individual defendants noticed something off with Pastora, but Pastora received medical assessments and even the medical officials assessed Pastora as vomiting and did not think she was attempting to suffocate herself with her fist.”

Bernal’s dismissal of the case was strike three for Toghraie. His lawsuit was first dismissed in December 2021 — four months after he filed it. He filed an amended lawsuit in March 2022, which was dismissed about three months later. He then appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeal, which reversed the dismissal on some of the alleged actions, allowing Toghraie to file a third amended complaint on May 15, 2024, which Bernal ruled on in November.

Reached by telephone Friday, Toghraie, who now resides in Barcelona, Spain, but visits his mother in Southern California several times a year, said he was unhappy with Bernal’s decision, but said it is now time to move on.

“I was extremely disappointed in the ruling,” Toghraie said. “I fought this for four years. It takes such a toll on you. In some ways, you just want to move on and get on with your life. It’s just so physically and emotionally draining. I just want my daughter to rest in peace, but I hate the outcome.”

He said if there is anything his case can illustrate, it is the failures of the criminal justice and carceral systems to care for and protect mentally ill inmates.

“Having a mental health issue does not mean they shouldn’t take care of you,” Toghraie said. “This country has a long way to go as to taking care of its mentally ill people.”

Under a settlement agreement unanimously approved by the school board on April 22, Sabine Robertson-Phillips will remain on paid leave — at a salary of about $25,000 a month — from now until Sept. 1. At that point, her resignation will take effect and she will retire.

She then will receive a lump sum check equivalent to 10 months’ pay — about $260,000 — to cover her compensation through the remaining term of her employment contract, which ends on June 30, 2026. Robertson-Phillips also will be able to cash out 44 days of accrued vacation and be eligible to receive retiree medical benefits.

Placed on leave

Robertson-Phillips, 54, was placed on paid leave on April 25, 2024 — the same day the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights released a damning 20-page letter to Superintendent Juan Cabral with its findings from a four-year investigation, which concluded that the district, among other things, failed to respond properly to 74% of 35 reports of sexual abuse against students from 2017 to 2020.

According to the OCR’s letter, the district’s boundaries policy calls for school supervisors and the “assigned human resources administrator” to promptly investigate possible violations of sexual misconduct involving staff and students.

Scapegoating alleged

In a claim filed against the district in September, Robertson-Phillips, who has collected about $330,000 in pay from the district since she was placed on leave, alleged Redlands Unified scapegoated her and tried to fire her following the federal probe and a parallel investigation by the state Department of Justice, which released its own report a month after the OCR’s. The DOJ concluded that the district “systemically violated laws in place to protect students against and address complaints related to sexual assault, harassment and abuse.”

Robertson-Phillips alleged in her claim that the district breached the terms of its employment contract with her, and that she was never found culpable of any wrongdoing, nor had she received any negative performance evaluations in her 17 years as HR director.

The district commissioned an administrative investigation into Robertson-Phillips during her leave, but it produced no findings of misconduct, according to the settlement agreement. However, the district and Robertson-Phillips reached an impasse and decided to part ways.

“An employment dispute has arisen between the parties. No findings of misconduct were made following the district’s review of the matter. Nevertheless, the employee and employer believe it is in their respective best interests to sever the employment relationship,” according to the agreement.

No admission of wrongdoing

Per the agreement, the district will further sweeten the pot for Robertson-Phillips by paying her $150,000 to settle her claim, typically a precursor to a lawsuit. The payment will be made on June 30, 2026, when the term of Robertson-Phillips’ employment contract ends.

The terms of the settlement agreement are not an “admission or finding of liability, misconduct, or wrongdoing by either employer or employee.”

Robertson-Phillips, who began her career at Redlands Unified in 1995 as a fifth-grade teacher at Crafton Elementary School, has served as the district’s assistant superintendent of human resources since 2007.

Stephen Larson, Robertson-Phillips’ attorney, said she agreed to settle her legal claims in exchange for the district paying her everything owed under her contract plus an additional severance amount.

“This resolution, in which the district explicitly acknowledged it had not found any misconduct by Dr. Robertson-Phillips, allows her to focus on the next phase of her life, retiring effective September 1, 2025, after over 30 years of exemplary service to the district,” Larson said in a statement.

The district declined to comment.

Lisa Nakamura-Bruich has been serving as the acting assistant superintendent of human resources since Oct. 9, district spokesperson Christine Stephens said.

SCNG investigation

The OCR and DOJ investigations, which began in 2020 and 2022, respectively, followed a more than yearlong investigation by the Southern California News Group that began in 2018 and revealed that the district, for decades, frequently failed to report to authorities teachers and other employees accused of grooming and sexually abusing students.

Robertson-Phillips became a focal point of the investigation when it was revealed she allegedly obstructed a police raid at the district office in July 2013 during the investigation of former Citrus Valley High School teacher Laura Whitehurst. The two lead investigators in the case testified in sworn depositions that Robertson-Phillips was caught in her office deleting files from her computer and instructed staff not to cooperate with police, and to lawyer up if approached by detectives.

Robertson-Phillips denied the allegations, saying in an email to the Southern California News Group in 2018 she had a “proven track record of working collaboratively with the police on cases” throughout her tenure as assistant superintendent.

Whitehurst, who became impregnated by one of her victims and bore his child, pleaded guilty to six felony counts associated with three victims following her July 2013 arrest. She served six months in jail and registered as a sex offender.

Robertson-Phillips also had been aware of inappropriate conduct involving former Redlands High School special education teacher and golf coach Kevin Patrick Kirkland, who preyed on vulnerable female students for more than three years and groomed them for sex.

She twice admonished Kirkland about his conduct. The first was in June 2012, when she gave him a four-page notice of unprofessional conduct citing six incidents of Kirkland sending inappropriate text messages to his classroom aide, who subsequently reported Kirkland to school administrators, according to internal school district records, police reports and sworn depositions.

And in May 2015, Robertson-Phillips admonished Kirkland again after a parent complained he was having a “special relationship” with a student and was seen off campus with two female students buying ice cream. Robertson-Phillips warned Kirkland it was “absolutely vital” that he “maintain proper teacher-student boundaries at all times.”

None of the incidents, however, involved alleged sexual misconduct, only inappropriate teacher-student boundary violations. But student and parent complaints about Kirkland’s inappropriate conduct involving female students dated as far back as 2006 or 2007, the SCNG investigation found.

In December 2018, the district announced it was adopting sweeping reforms and implemented its ACT (Actions Create Trust) Now initiative that included 10 measures to enhance student safety and raise awareness with employees. Three years later, in 2021, the district touted those reforms as paying off.

Reports of the district’s lapses in reporting and thwarting student sexual abuse also prompted a probe by the San Bernardino County civil grand jury, which released a report in the spring of 2022 concluding that, despite the district’s best efforts, many employees were still vague on state-mandated reporter laws and did not have a clear understanding of “reasonable suspicion” — information rising to the level that it warrants reporting suspected abuse to law enforcement or the Department of Children and Family Services.

Morgan Stewart, an attorney for the Irvine law firm Manly, Stewart & Finaldi, which since 2016 has collected $45.5 million from Redlands Unified to settle lawsuits by former students claiming they were sexually abused, has long called for Robertson-Phillips’ resignation.

Though he was pleased about her resignation, Stewart was not content with the assertion she committed no wrongdoing.

“I think the testimony from the police department was pretty clear that she was culpable in covering up sexual abuse. And the findings from the Department of Justice and Office for Civil Rights investigations further confirm that,” Stewart said. “Those investigations support the conclusion that Redlands Unified has covered up and protected sexual abusers on its campuses going back 20-plus years.”