Gilroy, CA – A new lawsuit filed by a former employee is drawing attention to the Gilroy Police Department, amid accusations that high-ranking officials promoted an environment that was rife with sexual misconduct, which included everything from sex parties to inappropriate relations with underage members of the "Police Explorers" program.

After 25 years with the department, Patricia Harrell was fired from her position as a senior police communications supervisor in 2015, just three years before she was set to retire with full benefits. While she was allegedly fired for "improper conduct" with trainees, Harrell claims that she was just trying to warn them about the situation in the GPD, according to an explosive report from the Gilroy Dispatch.

Harrell's lawsuit dropped the names of not only officers but several of their wives and girlfriends as well. She indicated that working for the police department equated with enduring years of unwanted advances, sexual impropriety on the part of officers, and retaliation when Harrell spoke out. The Gilroy Dispatch reported that Harrell's claim in the lawsuit include:

• Two officers "had sexual intercourse with members of the Gilroy Explorers, comprised of youth ranging in age from fourteen (14) to twenty-one (21). When their conduct came to light, [one] was demoted, but then 'got his stripes' back, while [the other] was allowed to resign."
• "At office parties, GPD employees would throw their keys in a bowl and whoever pulled a key had sex with the person who owned the key."
• The wife of an officer, who also was a department employee, proudly displayed her pierced genitalia to pool party guests, prompting several "mortified" mothers to leave with their children.
• That woman's police officer husband, when they were engaged, "brought a Salinas police officer to 'screw her' while [he] watched. She later stated that she did not do it."
• The same woman invited another officer to touch her breasts while they were in the Communications Center, and he did.
• The same GPD employee "kept a book in which she documented all of the sexual improprieties that occurred at the GPD, so that she could reveal the information should she ever be disciplined for her misdeeds. [She stated] 'If she goes down, other people are going down with her.' [She] also claimed that [her police officer husband] supported the fact that she was keeping a book."
• At a Gilroy Police Officers' Association Christmas party, "the female spouses [of two GPD officers] were outrageously intoxicated and were sexually touching both males and females including each other. Also, several people at the party were taking pictures of females exposing their private parts."
• On a separate occasion, [an officer] showed sexually explicit photos that were inside a locker depicting GPD personnel groping [a communications staffer]."