He helped arrest her and helped bail her out: Deputy out after affair with jail inmate

A little before noon on Dec. 30, 2021, two off-duty Ventura County sheriff’s deputies were having a late breakfast at Two Trees Restaurant and Taps in East Ventura when they saw a man and a woman walk in together. It was raining, and the couple was sharing an umbrella, according to security camera footage later reviewed by sheriff's detectives.

The deputies recognized the man, a colleague named Tyler Ebell. He’d worked with one of them recently at Ventura County Jail, and he was a familiar face around town, as one of the greatest high school football players in Ventura County history. In 2000, his senior year at Ventura High School, he set a national record for rushing yards and went on to play at UCLA.

One of the off-duty deputies recognized the woman, too. She was Nastaza Schmidt, a recent jail inmate who was free on bail.

Schmidt had worked in the booking area as an inmate. She stood out in the jail, because she was tall — at 5 feet 10 inches, an inch taller than Ebell — slender and pretty. She had gotten out about five months earlier, after doing nearly a year awaiting trial for identity theft, possession of drug paraphernalia and possession of burglary tools, the latest in a long string of arrests and jail stints for property and drug crimes.

The deputies who spotted Schmidt and Ebell would later describe the scene for sheriff's detectives conducting an internal affairs investigation. That investigation resulted in a 1,645-page report that the Ventura County Sheriff's Office recently provided to the Star pursuant to a public records request. Schmidt would later drop dead fleeing a crime scene in Thousand Oaks.

Back at Two Trees, Ebell made eye contact with one of the off-duty deputies while he and Schmidt were being seated. Two minutes after they’d walked in, Ebell got up, walked into the bar area and left through a side door. He had to unlock the door and push it open, shoving aside a few chairs that were blocking the exit from the outside.

A minute later, Schmidt got up and left through the front door.

That was the beginning of the end of their relationship, and of Ebell’s career with the sheriff’s office. The deputies who saw him with Schmidt — on a morning when he’d called in late to work for a family medical reason — reported the incident to Ebell’s boss. Days later, the department opened its investigation, and less than a month after he ducked out the side door of Two Trees, Ebell was put on paid administrative leave.

'A path of destructive behavior'

Ebell, 40, left the sheriff’s office on Dec. 29, 2022, almost a year to the day after he was spotted at the restaurant with Schmidt.

At the conclusion of the internal affairs investigation, the agency issued him a notice of proposed dismissal. Ebell appealed the discipline but the order was upheld by an assistant sheriff, and he resigned before a final notice of dismissal could be served, said Capt. Dean Worthy, an agency spokesperson.

The formal charges were dishonesty, failure of good behavior, corrupt use of official authority, inexcusable neglect of duty, acts incompatible with public service and acts inimical to public service.

The internal affairs investigation concluded that Ebell pursued a romantic relationship with Schmidt while she was in jail and carried on a sexual affair with her after she was released. Her name is redacted in the version of the report provided to the Star, but her identity was confirmed by numerous sources, including her attorney, a close friend and a family member.

In the letter informing Ebell of his proposed dismissal, Cmdr. Cory Rubright, the head of professional standards for the sheriff's office, wrote, "The evidence gathered during the Internal Affairs investigation overwhelmingly concludes that you committed repeated acts of serious misconduct and grossly violated the foundational principals of a law enforcement officer."

The investigation found evidence that Ebell put money into Schmidt's jail account; gave her grandparents cash to help pay her bail; snuck food, books and jewelry into the jail for her; listened to recordings of her phone calls with other people; used law enforcement databases to look up information on her and her friends; exchanged explicit texts and phone calls with her; ignored evidence that she was engaged in criminal activity; threatened to beat up her ex-boyfriend; and physically injured her on at least one occasion.

The sheriff’s office has forwarded Ebell's case to the California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training, which will conduct its own investigation to determine if he should be barred from holding any law enforcement jobs in California.

The POST decertification board was established by a new state law that went into effect at the start of 2023; since then, 45 former officers in the state have had their eligibility either suspended or revoked, or surrendered it voluntarily while under investigation. If the board takes action against Ebell, he would be the first law enforcement officer from Ventura County to be barred from law enforcement jobs in California.

Ebell is also the subject of an “open, active criminal investigation” by the Ventura County Sheriff’s Office, Worthy said.

George Tourkow, Ebell's lawyer in a related civil case, said in a statement emailed to The Star that Ebell "vehemently denies the allegations" and cannot comment further while litigation is pending.

Ebell told sheriff's detectives investigating his case that he had "made a bunch of huge f---in' mistakes" and was "not minimizing anything that I did," according to a transcript of an interview on June 22, 2022 — though in that interview, he denied at first that he had a relationship with Schmidt.

Ebell told the detectives he had been on "a path of destructive behavior" that included drinking every day.

"It was a tough year for me," he said, referring to 2021. "I was going through a lot of emotional stuff, and I made a ton of poor decisions that's not typically my character. I was looking for an escape and I found it in a friend, and it was the wrong friend in the wrong place. And I did a lot of things that I would never normally do when I'm in the right mindset."

Two deaths and a lawsuit

By the time Ebell gave that interview, his relationship with Schmidt appears to have ended. She was still free on bail, living in Ventura with her grandparents and working at a UPS facility. She was engaged to the man Ebell had allegedly threatened.

Schmidt was arrested again in February, this time in Santa Barbara County, and charged with identity theft, grand theft and receiving stolen property. On Feb. 24, she pleaded not guilty.

On Feb. 28, Schmidt died in Thousand Oaks, at the age of 34.

Sheriff’s detectives said she and two men were burglarizing a unit in a self-storage facility that morning when the unit’s owner happened by. Schmidt and the others tried to drive away. With the trailer hitched to their truck, they couldn't get out of the driveway, and they ran.

Schmidt collapsed on the front lawn of a home about two blocks away, at 9 a.m., and was pronounced dead by paramedics 45 minutes later, according to an investigative report by the Ventura County Medical Examiner's Office. Security video reviewed by sheriff's deputies showed that she was alone, and no one saw her fall or came to her aid, the report states.

Blood tests revealed “a level of methamphetamine considered lethal” in her system, according to the medical examiner's autopsy report. The investigator concluded that she died of “probable cardiac arrest, possibly related to drug use and over stimulation from fleeing a crime scene.”

About a month before she died, Schmidt filed a federal lawsuit against the county of Ventura and Ebell. In the lawsuit, she accused Ebell of sexual battery, assault, infliction of emotional distress and violation of her civil rights. She said he coerced her into a relationship by promising to help her with her criminal charges, stalked and harassed her and her then-ex-boyfriend, and pressured her into having an abortion when she became pregnant.

"This is someone who was in a position of power and used it to manipulate a woman into having sex with him," said Ron Bamieh, who was Schmidt's attorney in the civil case and some of her criminal cases.

Ebell and Schmidt never had any sexual contact while she was in jail, according to the internal affairs investigation. They exchanged love notes, talked for hours on the phone — on calls recorded by the jail — and made plans to get together after she got out. He offered to help her, financially and otherwise, but was not recorded demanding anything in return.

A fellow inmate and friend of Schmidt's told internal affairs detectives their relationship was "mutual." But Bamieh said it was coerced from the very beginning, when Ebell told Schmidt he would help her with her case if she was "nice to him."

"You can't blame the victim for trying to rationalize her behavior and make it seem like it was something more," Bamieh said. "She was facing 20-plus years in state prison ... so she was willing to have a relationship with him for that leniency."

Schmidt was joined in the lawsuit by another woman who said Ebell sexually harassed her while she was on probation. The two women also accused the county of negligence in hiring, training and supervising Ebell.

Bamieh said it should have been obvious to the sheriff's office that Ebell was acting inappropriately toward Schmidt. Other deputies working in the jail told internal affairs investigators they often saw Ebell stop by the booking area to chat with Schmidt in a casual, flirtatious and unprofessional manner. One deputy said they talked "several times per shift," for 20 minutes or more each time.

"Saying you didn't know is kind of a cop-out, because if they'd just opened their eyes, they would have seen it," Bamieh said. "It was right in front of them the whole time."

In a statement emailed to the Star, Ventura County Sheriff Jim Fryhoff said he can't comment on the specifics of Ebell's case because of the pending lawsuit.

"However, we hold our employees to the highest standards," Fryhoff said. "If employees are found to have violated these standards, the sheriff's office moves swiftly to hold them accountable for their actions."

Bamieh said the suit is on hold while attorneys and the judge discuss what to do about Schmidt's death. It's possible for a relative to continue with the lawsuit on her behalf, Bamieh said, but the potential damages would be reduced greatly from what Schmidt herself could have sought.

Further complicating the lawsuit, Bamieh said, is the fact that another key potential witness died last year.

After the relationship between Ebell and Schmidt ended, she got engaged to Nick Cooper of Santa Barbara, the ex-boyfriend who had received threating texts from Ebell.

Cooper was killed Aug. 16 in a motorcycle crash on Highway 150, west of Lake Casitas. According to the California Highway Patrol, his Kawasaki Ninja crossed into oncoming traffic and was hit by an oncoming SUV driven by a woman from Carpinteria, in a "catastrophic crash."

'Such a sweet girl'

Like Ebell, Schmidt was a Ventura native. Her mother was 16 when she was born, and her father was never a presence in her life.

Nastaza — "Taza" to almost everyone she knew — spent her childhood living with her mother and her mother's parents, said her mom, Cecilia Grigsby. Schmidt took dance classes for more than 10 years, Grigsby said, and ran track at Ventura High.

"She was such a sweet girl. Everybody liked her," Grigsby said.

Jessica Brontsema, a friend of Schmidt's since they were both in elementary school, said there was some "normal teenage rebellious stuff" when Schmidt was in high school, and she also attended El Camino High School, an alternative public school in Ventura.

But Grigsby and Brontsema both said there was never any hint of a drug problem until Schmidt was in her 20s.

Brontsema said she fell out of touch with Schmidt for a few years after high school, and when they connected again, Schmidt had a methamphetamine habit and a new group of friends.

"I was kind of shocked at everything that had happened," Brontsema said. "She didn’t seem like that type of person."

After high school, Schmidt had pursued a certification to work in the medical field, her mother said. When Schmidt was 21, she had a son.

Not long after, Grigsby and Schmidt lived together on their own for the only time. Grigsby said it soon became clear that her daughter was regularly using methamphetamine, and since Grigsby had a young child in the home — Schmidt's half brother — she told her daughter to move out.

Schmidt and her son moved in with Grigsby's parents, just a couple of blocks away in the same Ventura neighborhood.

Mother and daughter reunited only once, Grigsby said. In 2015, Schmidt got out of jail and moved into a sober living house in Los Angeles.

"I thought she was getting better, and that's when me and her tried to reconnect," Grigsby said. "She was doing good, and then she moved back to Ventura and right back into the drug scene."

Grigsby said the last time they spoke was in 2016. But because they lived so close to each other, Grigsby saw her daughter regularly, including the day before she died.

Brontsema said that time around 2015 was hard on Schmidt because she felt like "she was doing everything she was supposed to be doing," and still couldn't keep custody of her son.

"She would do anything to be in her son's life," Brontsema said. "She was just heartbroken about that. ... It really beat her up in the long run."

Schmidt was arrested in 2014 in connection with a string of automobile burglaries in Thousand Oaks. In 2016, she was arrested again and charged with residential burglary, petty theft and identity theft. She pleaded guilty and was sentenced to state prison, where she served 26 months, according to information provided by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.

'Half cop, half robber'

Schmidt left Central California Women's Facility in Chowchilla on July 22, 2019 and moved back to Ventura. In the 14 months after that, she was arrested three times in Ventura County and charged with crimes including identity theft, possession of burglary tools and carjacking.

During two of those arrests — one in March 2020 and one in September 2020 — Ebell was one of the arresting officers, though Schmidt would tell internal affairs investigators that Ebell didn't put handcuffs on her or "technically" arrest her.

The September arrest was the one that kept Schmidt in Ventura County Jail for most of a year. A friend of Schmidt's told internal affairs detectives that when Schmidt was arrested and her cell phone was taken as evidence, Ebell looked through it and found intimate video of Schmidt and her boyfriend.

Ebell was on the sheriff's gang unit at the time of the arrest, but in November 2020 he was transferred to the jail and promoted to senior deputy, a supervisory position. He immediately began hanging around the female booking desk and talking to Schmidt, according to the internal affairs report, which included a review of video footage from the jail.

He would often bring her food from the staff cafeteria or from a restaurant, something that was typically reserved for inmates who'd been doing extra work. In February, he brought her chocolate covered strawberries.

During the internal affairs investigation, a detective asked one of Schmidt's fellow inmate workers if the inmates knew something was going on between Ebell and Schmidt.

"Oh, we all knew," the inmate said. "It was definitely not hidden. There was no secret about it."

Ebell sometimes told people that Schmidt was his informant, and their conversations were for the purpose of gathering information. In his interview with internal affairs, Ebell admitted she had never been an informant.

Ebell was transferred out of the jail in March 2021 and into a job in Camarillo, the internal affairs report states. Soon after, he was assigned to the Senate Bill 1421 Redaction Task Force, which means he reviewed internal affairs reports on deputies' uses of force and alleged misconduct and redacted sensitive names and details so the reports could be released to the public.

"Due to the unique nature of this assignment, Ebell had minimum supervision and oversight," Rubright wrote in a memo recommending Ebell's dismissal. "Subsequently, Ebell's fraternization with the female increased."

Schmidt would call Ebell from the jail, using another inmate's code for the phone. Between April and August of 2021, Ebell and Schmidt spoke for a total of 138 hours on 356 separate calls, according to the internal affairs investigation. They also exchanged texts and written letters.

Calls from the jail are recorded, and summaries and excepts of their calls are included in the internal affairs report. Schmidt told Ebell about burglarizing cars, said she had stolen goods in storage and talked about having someone close out a couple of storage units. In one call, Schmidt joked that if they had a baby, it would be "half cop, half robber."

Their phone conversations were "flirtatious and sexually explicit in nature, often referring to your plans for a sexual relationship upon the female's release from custody," Rubright wrote to Ebell in the letter of dismissal. "You often used sexual innuendos throughout your conversations, and you were the primary instigator when the conversations turned sexual."

Ebell visited the jail about once a week during this period, sometimes sneaking items in for Schmidt. On May 20, 2021, Schmidt told him on the phone that the new Starbucks Strawberry Funnel Cake Frappucino looked good.

"OK, I might be able to make that happen for you," Ebell told her, according to the internal affairs report. The next day, he brought her one, poured into a plain cup.

That day, he also brought her two books that she'd asked for: installments in the fantasy romance series "Anita Blake: Vampire Hunter," by Laurell K. Hamilton. The books are on the jail's list of banned titles due to their sexual content.

In June, Ebell brought Schmidt a set of nipple rings, hiding them in an empty coffee cup. Two weeks later, she told him that she'd lost one of them, and he brought her another set.

Schmidt was released from jail on Aug. 3, 2021. Ebell was partially responsible; he admitted to giving her grandparents $5,000 in cash so they could show enough assets to a bail bonds company to secure her release. In her lawsuit, Schmidt said the amount was $11,000.

Ebell also helped pay bail for Schmidt's friend and co-defendant. He told investigators he didn't remember how much he gave her.

A rocky relationship

When Schmidt walked out of the jail at the Government Center in Ventura the evening of Aug. 3, 2021, Ebell was waiting to pick her up. Two hours earlier, he had called the jail and asked a deputy to rush her release.

The night Schmidt got out of jail, Ebell took her to Gigi's Cocktail Lounge, a bar about a mile and a half away, then home to her grandparents' house.

Schmidt told investigators she saw Ebell on a daily basis after she got out of jail. She "described their relationship similar to normal couples in a dating relationship, including having dinners and going to a movie theater," the internal affairs report states.

There were problems. Schmidt told detectives that "Ebell’s marital status was a source of constant friction between her and Ebell, which led to repeated arguments," the report states.

Shortly after her release, Ebell invited Schmidt to stay at his house in Ventura because his wife and children were out of town, according to Schmidt's civil lawsuit. For two and a half weeks, she spent nights there and days at her grandparents' house. Ebell told her to duck in his vehicle until it was in the garage and to hide from the neighbors, according to Schmidt's lawsuit, which says she "felt like a prisoner."

Schmidt's relationship with Cooper was also a source of conflict. Cooper told detectives that he thought Ebell viewed him as a "threat" because of his past with Schmidt. Cooper said Ebell listened to his phone calls with Schmidt while she was in jail, and after she got out, Ebell called and texted him several times, telling him to "leave her the f--- alone."

Cooper told detectives that one morning — he thought it was in October 2021 — Ebell found Cooper and Schmidt together and "just snapped." While trying to get to Cooper, Ebell grabbed Schmidt and threw her on the bed. She hit the nightstand and hurt her arm or shoulder, Cooper said, and later that day she was treated at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital.

After that argument, Cooper was driving in Ventura when Ebell pulled up next to him and yelled at him to pull over, Cooper told detectives. Their argument continued in a McDonald's parking lot. Cooper said Ebell told him, "If I catch you talking to her, I'll f--- you up. And I'm not talking about some cop shit. I'm talking about gangster shit."

The beginning of the end

The relationship between Ebell and Schmidt ended around the time they were spotted at Two Trees Restaurant in December 2021. She told detectives they'd already stopped seeing each other by then, while Cooper said the internal affairs investigation ended the relationship soon after.

In her lawsuit, Schmidt said Ebell contacted her shortly after her abortion and told her he would no longer see her and not to contact him again. After the internal affairs investigation started, he told her to delete all of their text messages, the lawsuit states.

At some point in 2022, Schmidt and Cooper got engaged.

Cooper "was someone she was comfortable around," Brontsema said. "He loved her very much. He’d take care of her. He really was her best friend."

His death brought Brontsema and Schmidt closer, Brontsema said. A few years ago, her longtime boyfriend died, and Schmidt was her shoulder to cry on.

"I was able to go to her whenever I needed somebody," Brontsema said. "She would just sit with me and let me cry. She’d pick me up to get my nails done, bring me food, try to bring me up. … When she lost her fiance, Nick, I knew what she was going through."

Brontsema said Schmidt's death still "doesn't seem real."

"No matter how much time went by, every time we'd see each other it was like no time went by," she said. "So I just keep feeling like I'm going to see her tonight."

Though they were estranged, Schmidt's mother said she had heard rumors that her daughter was dating a law enforcement officer.

"It's just so crazy," Grigsby said. "It sounds like he was just begging to get caught. They both were."

Ebell's interview with the internal affairs detectives took seven and a half hours. At one point, he told the detectives that the whole affair had "actually kind of been a good thing in my life, because this forced to me get help."

"I'm getting myself back together," he said. "I just wasn't in a good head space, and I had a lot going on emotionally. ... I look back and I'm like, 'Who the f--- was that person?' because that person wasn't me, you know?"

Tony Biasotti is an investigative and watchdog reporter for the Ventura County Star. Reach him at tbiasotti@vcstar.com. This story was made possible by a grant from the Ventura County Community Foundation's Fund to Support Local Journalism.

This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Ventura County sheriff's deputy out after affair with jail inmate