A peephole, too
Ex-cop’s suit: Capt. who raped me a locker room perv
A disgraced NYPD captain who headed up the Yankee Stadium security detail had a peephole in his office that he used to spy on female officers in the women’s locker room, according to an officer who has accused him of rape.
In 2021, Capt. Jeffrey Brienza called now-retired Officer Gillian Roberts into his office at Yankee Stadium, where the NYPD has a substation for officers assigned to game security, and told her he was “seeing everything that took place in the female locker room,” according to the former policewoman’s Friday affidavit.
“I asked him how was that possible?” Roberts said in the court papers. “Shockingly, I witnessed him turn towards the wall and remove a calendar or some other paper exposing a peephole and he proceeded to peep through the hole while laughing.”
Roberts’ lawyer Fred Lichtmacher filed the affidavit hoping to persuade Judge Mitchell Danziger to issue a judicial subpoena that would require Yankee Stadium to provide any information regarding the possible discovery of the peephole and whatever work was done to close it up.
‘‘It’s my job to collect as much evidence as I can to support what was going on in the Yankee Stadium detail,” Lichtmacher said.
“This evidence could well be relevant to his behavior, what they may have known about his behavior and allowed it to continue. It may lead to more witnesses coming forward. I don’t really know.
“What I know is that this is an act that’s consistent with the behavior described by my client.”
Brienza, a 27-year veteran, was fired in October after pleading guilty to administrative charges connected to the 2021 Bronx Supreme Court lawsuit in which Roberts said he raped her at the Stadium a number of times when they both worked the coveted detail.
Brienza, 49, who could not be reached for comment, has denied the rape allegations.
His lawyer Paul Ernenwein denied the voyeuristic claim.
“At no time was there access or viewing opportunity,” he said.
The city Law Department, whose lawyers represent the city in the suit, and a spokesman for the Yankees, who are not named in the suit, did not respond to a request for comment.
Roberts said in the suit that Brienza first attacked her in a Stadium bathroom in June 2020 and then continued to force himself on her for more than a year after that.
“He grabbed me from behind around my waist,” Roberts said.
“I grabbed him and I was peeling his hands from around my waist and I felt his grip tightening and at that point, I realized what he was doing so I said, ‘No.’ He said, ‘Yes.’ ”
The mother of three alleged Brienza forced her to perform oral sex on him, then pushed her up against a sink and raped her, the lawsuit details.
“There was a lot of things going through my head,” the officer remembered. “I was kind of blaming myself like maybe I could have yelled louder.”
Brienza later admitted to her he could get in trouble if she told anyone what had happened, the ex-cop said.
“Everyone thinks he’s a great guy,” she said at the time. “Everyone loves him. I was new to the Stadium. I was afraid to say anything because he’s the captain.”
The alleged abuse continued, with Brienza forcing her to perform oral sex on him in his office or in her car, sometimes more than once a day, the lawsuit alleges.
After telling her union rep what was going on, the Internal Affairs Bureau opened an investigation, with Brienza transferred to the 25th Precinct in East Harlem.