Sacramento gave $1.7M payout to family for alleged elder abuse. Ex-deputy calls it retaliation
Sacramento County has paid a $1.75 million settlement to the family of an elderly woman who allegedly was the victim of elder abuse — an allegation that an ex-deputy involved in the case said was made in retaliation.
The lawsuit, filed in 2020 in Sacramento Superior Court by Rosalie Achiu’s conservator, alleged then-deputies Stephanie Angel and Joseph Martin “took control” of Achiu’s assets and bank accounts, then put her on a one-way flight to the Philippines.
The Sacramento Sheriff’s Office in 2018 fired Angel and Martin as a result of the incident. But Angel claims they never stole from Achiu, and that she was fired in retaliation for a sexual harassment settlement she won about nine years prior.
Angel, then a Sacramento Sheriff’s deputy, sued the Sheriff’s Office in 2007 in Sacramento Superior Court. The lawsuit alleged then-Sgt. Ramos Santos repeatedly asked Angel out, sending her sexually harassing text messages on his county cellphone, and would “angrily object” when she would decline his advances.
The lawsuit alleged office leadership did not discipline Santos, and instead allowed him to punish Angel with a less desirable position within the Main Jail. That lawsuit named as a defendant Scott Jones, then a captain, who was sheriff in 2018 when the office fired Angel.
“I won a civil suit against the very people who initiated this (Achiu) investigation,” Angel told The Sacramento Bee Wednesday.
The county paid a settlement to Angel in 2009, court records show. County spokeswoman Kim Nava did not immediately provide the settlement amount Thursday.
Ramos is no longer a Sacramento Sheriff’s deputy, Sheriff’s spokesman Sgt. Amar Gandhi said.
How deputies met the senior citizen
Angel and Martin met Achiu in January 2018 when they responded to a welfare check call to her North Highlands home.
The pair befriended her, and a few days later moved her out of her home and into Angel’s residence, the lawsuit alleges. A few days after that, they opened a joint bank account with Achiu and withdrew “several thousands” of dollars. They then traveled to Achiu’s bank and had the bank drill out the locks of Achiu’s safe deposit box, then removed all the contents.
Three days later, Achiu’s house was for sale, the lawsuit alleges, and the house had been stripped down with many of Achiu’s belongings thrown away. The pair then took Achiu to an attorney who prepared a Durable Power of Attorney for Management of Property and Personal Affairs and an Advance Health Care Directive. It named Achiu as the principal, Angel as the principal agent, and Martin as a successor agent.
On Feb. 1, 2018, the pair drove Achiu in their patrol vehicle to the airport and placed her unaccompanied on a one-way flight to the Philippines, paid for by her own bank account, the lawsuit alleges.
The lawsuit alleges that several days later, the U.S. Marshall Service located Achiu in the Philippines, and she said she did not know how she got there and that she wanted to return home to California.
Angel said that is false — that she saw a document that said Achiu was told if she did not leave the Philippines and return to the US they would freeze all her assets.
Angel said she had Achiu cleared by doctors and lawyers before sending her to the Philippines. She said she needed to have access to Achiu’s bank accounts so she could pay her bills on her house and buy her luggage.
“She had been trying to get back to her family for like two years,” Angel said. “...the doctor said she was fine to travel. She said, ‘I may come back in a month I may come back in two months.’ I didn’t want anything bad to happen so I wanted to make sure it was all on the up and up.”
The lawsuit named the county, Angel, Martin, Kirchner and Tuttle as defendants. It claimed elder financial abuse, physical elder abuse, intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligence, and 14th Amendment Constitutional violations.
Angel said by the end of the case, though, Achiu’s lawyers were working with Angel.
“Rosalie’s attorney realized after that our intentions were pure of heart and the county is the one who made a mistake, not us,” Angel said. “They portrayed us as these horrible officers. But they have no evidence of us doing anything wrong.”
Gandhi declined comment on the case other than to say the the Sheriff’s Office terminated Angel and Martin Nov. 8, 2018.
Achiu died in January 2023, and the settlement agreement with her estate was signed in March 2023, the agreement states.
Neither Angel nor Martin were charged criminally in the matter, Sacramento District Attorney’s Office spokeswoman Shelly Orio said.
They both are still working as “civil servants,” Angel said. She declined to name which governmental entity they are working for or to provide their job titles.
