SEXUAL ASSAULT ALLEGED: THE ACCUSED
4 WOMEN SUE CHESTER & OFFICER, CLAIM CITY IGNORED THEIR CLAIMS
The complaint says Ross was hired by the city in 2013. During his application period, city officials discovered that he had previous law enforcement experience working at the Chester Housing Authority, the county prison in Concord and the Darby Borough Police Department, but had been accused of sexual assault and sexual harassment at all three.
Four women have filed a federal lawsuit against suspended Chester City Police Officer Albert Ross and the city, alleging officials there allowed him to “repeatedly and forcibly” touch, fondle and disrobe women against their will for years despite multiple reports of his actions.
“I think that it suggests that there is a certain lack of discipline, a lack of supervision in certain specific circumstances, and maybe they may have tolerated more aberrant behavior than they really should have,” said the plaintiffs’ attorney Gerard Schrom, who filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania last week. “The motto of most police forces is ‘To protect and serve,’ and clearly they were not doing that.”
The complaint alleges five claims for due process, statecreated danger, gender discrimination, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and a Monell claim that the city effectively established a custom and policy permitting sexual abuse by Ross and other officers.
City Solicitor Kenneth Schuster did not return calls for comment last week.
Ross, 48, is also a defendant in three criminal cases involving some of the same allegations noted in the civil complaint. He is charged with stalking, indecent assault, harassment and official oppression in those cases, all of which are scheduled for trial Sept. 11 before Delaware County Court of Common Pleas Judge James P. Bradley.
Defense attorney Enrique Latoison, who previously represented Ross, said he is no longer involved with Ross at any level. It was unclear whether Ross had secured a new attorney for the criminal or civil matters.
The complaint says Ross was hired by the city in 2013. During his application period, city officials discovered that he had previous law enforcement experience working at the Chester Housing Authority, the county prison in Concord and the Darby Borough Police Department, but had been accused of sexual assault and sexual harassment at all three.
Sources said police leadership had fought against Chester City Council hiring Ross due to those past issues.
For three years, Ross worked inside the department without his certification from the Municipal Police Officers Education and Training Commission, earning a full police officer’s salary of $36,986 and was assigned normal street duty in March or April of 2016, sources said.
The complaint states Ross was fired in August 2013 for insubordination, but was rehired in November of that year. City Council continued to review and renew his employment until his arrest in August 2017, the complaint says.
One woman claims in the complaint that Ross assaulted her in an elevator at the Chester City Police Department in April 2015, forcibly kissing her and leaving saliva on her face.
Another says he also sexually molested her as she exited an elevator at the police station August 25, 2015, pulling her against his body and lifting her shirt to grab and suck on her breast. The alleged victim said she reported the assault to the police station the following day, but her complaint was not investigated or acted upon.
The third woman claims Ross assaulted her while investigating a disturbance at her home May 20, 2017, by putting the butt-end of his flashlight down her shirt, pulling it open and saying, “Let me see.”
The fourth woman said Ross was investigating a home alarm call August 21, 2017, when he grabbed her breast and asked what she was doing later that day.
The lawsuit also describes an interaction between Ross and a fifth woman who is not a party to the lawsuit. In that case, Ross allegedly grabbed the woman’s breasts and fondled them as the two were talking outside her home. The complaint says she reported the incident to Detective Lisa Martini of the Delaware County Criminal Investigation Division, spurring the criminal charges.
In addition to individual claims against Ross, the plaintiffs allege city officials knew not only of prior bad acts, but also of Ross’s alleged ongoing assaults while on the Chester Police force and did nothing. The complaint also makes mention of another officer, Roosevelt Turner, who was convicted last year on two counts of official oppression for telling female prisoners to show him their vaginas in April 2015.
“Even after the arrests and convictions of other officers the City (Council) continued to tolerate and ignore reports of Officer Ross’s sexual assaults,” the complaint says. “Further, upon information and belief, other Chester police officers knew of and/or witnessed Officer Ross’s sexual assaults and that of other Chester police officers, and these officers tolerated Officer Ross’s behavior and that of officers and failed to report these incidents through official channels.”
By failing to investigate or discipline Ross, the complaint says the city established a custom and practice of permitting officers to engage in sexual molestation without disciplinary recourse and acted with deliberate indifference to his alleged actions.
As a result, the plaintiffs say they suffered damages including unwanted touching, pain and suffering, mental anguish, emotional distress, indignities, embarrassment and degradation, for which they are seeking punitive damages.
Schrom said he does not have a dollar figure in mind, but that it should be substantial enough to send a message “in no uncertain terms.” More critically, he hopes that the suit will also impose changes in the way the city hires and trains its police force going forward.
“It’s a different world for men and it’s a better world for women, and women are now going to be believed and, more ideally, men will be better behaved,” said Schrom. “The world community is moving toward embracing the rights of women and one of them is to walk down the street safely and unimpeded, without being accosted, especially by a police officer that you would go to for security and safety.”