Lawsuit accuses Mountain View police chief of sexual harassment

A dispatcher with the Mountain View Police Department hit the city’s police chief, Max Bosel, with a lawsuit claiming he and members of the SWAT team subjected her to “sexually explicit banter, lewd jokes, nudity and simulated sexual acts.”

Annie Lohman, 38, who has worked for the department since 2003, filed a lawsuit in Santa Clara County Superior Court against the city and Bosel, claiming that her complaints to human resources officials only prompted the chief to initiate a misconduct investigation against her.

The suit, filed Monday, says the alleged sexual misconduct started two years after Lohman was hired in 2005 as the dispatcher for the department’s SWAT team, which Bosel headed until he was elevated to chief in August 2014.

“Since joining the Department’s SWAT team ... plaintiff has been repeatedly subjected to sexually explicit banter, lewd jokes, nudity and simulated sexual acts,” the suit charges.

All departments within the City, and certainly the Police Department, hold integrity and respect as core organizational values, and there is no place for inappropriate or unprofessional behavior.

Rich added that the city is initiating additional training on sexual harassment prevention for all police staff “to ensure there is no uncertainty over what is expected of our Police Department employees and managers in confronting and correcting inappropriate conduct.”

The scrutiny, the suit claims, was all part of “Chief Bosel’s ultimate goal of pushing the plaintiff out of the Department because of her resistance to his unlawful, inappropriate conduct.”