2 Chico State police officers at center of Oroville Police sexual misconduct lawsuit
Ava Norgrove and Melvin Bui wrote this article for Chico State’s The Orion. It is available for republication or reference. If you think their work is important, you can support it here.
Chico State University Police Sgt. Joseph Deal and officer Raymond Stott have been accused of inappropriate sexual and police misconduct during their tenure at the Oroville Police Department, according to a federal civil rights lawsuit filed Tuesday by a former Oroville police officer.
The Orion has reached out to Chico State for comment and will update this article when a response is received. The Orion also reached out to UPD for a comment before press time.
Former OPD police officer Robert Raiter filed a federal civil rights lawsuit on Tuesday against the City of Oroville. Raiter alleges that OPD personnelle, including current University Police Sgt. Deal and University Police officer Stott, engaged in a litany of sexual harassment, sexual misconduct and police misconduct.
Deal served as OPD’s chief until 2021.
The Sacramento Bee was the first media outlet to break the story.
The lawsuit alleges that a female OPD officer, going by the initials M.H., filed an internal affairs complaint against Stott. According to the lawsuit: “Stott was continually calling her a b—- for several weeks and on one occasion Stott entered the break room where M.H. was eating alone. Stott asked M.H. if her burrito tasted like ‘p—-.’ Stott blocked M.H.’s exit so she could not leave while he was speaking to her.”
According to the lawsuit, Raiter was allegedly a witness for an Oroville Police internal affairs investigation and offered information about other misconduct he witnessed in the department.
“The suit claims instances of improper conduct went all the way up the chain to then-Chief Joe Deal, who allegedly had sex while on duty and frequently pressured officers planning to sell their homes to hire his wife as their realtor or face a backlash that included loss of overtime,” wrote The Sacramento Bee.
Raiter’s lawsuit alleges that Deal was upset that officers couldn’t talk M.H. out of filing the internal affairs complaint.
The lawsuit claims that Raiter spoke out about the misconduct. Subsequently, Raiter allegedly faced the loss of his overtime hours, the removal from key assignments and inconvenient changes to his schedule.
Raiter also accused Deal of misappropriating OPD resources. The lawsuit accuses Deal of giving or selling ammunition from the department armory to a member of the Oroville City Council.
The lawsuit alleged that Stott used seized evidence as office decorations and created false paperwork for the “lost evidence.”
Raiter was eventually fired in 2021 for allegedly admitting to having sex with his girlfriend while on duty, a practice the lawsuit claims was encouraged by OPD Chief Deal during his tenure. The lawsuit claims that Raiter was terminated after being “denied adequate due process.”
Ava Norgrove and Melvin Bui can be reached at orionmanagingeditor@gmail.com or @AvaNorgrove and @MELVINBUII on Twitter.
*The lawsuit is ongoing and this article will be updated as more information becomes available.