Seven former Owl Bookshop student employees agreed to settle their yearslong sexual harassment lawsuit with Citrus College for $510,000.
Citrus will pay the seven former employees who allege they were sexually harassed by former Owl Bookshop online coordinator Vincent Patino while at work.
Patino has since been convicted in criminal court for charges stemming from conduct at the bookstore.
The settlement document says Citrus College is not admitting any fault for the claims made by the former employees.
The complaint, filed on Oct. 27, 2017, says Human Resources Director Robert Sammis and bookstore manager Eric Magallon knew or should have known of Patino’s harassing conduct.
Sammis and Magallon failed to take quick action and did not properly train or implement procedures to educate their employees, court documents say.
The complaint says the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights found Sammis and Citrus did not have appropriate Title IX policies, procedures and training in place that would prevent Patino’s conduct.
Female employees did not know of their rights to a sexual harassment-free work environment or how to properly voice their complaints, court documents say.
Sammis and Magallon did not respond to phone messages and email requesting for comment.
In a Jan. 18 meeting, the Board of Trustees reviewed and unanimously approved a settlement agreement.
A hearing at Los Angeles County Superior Court for the settlement is scheduled for Sept. 27.
According to a notice of settlement document filed on Sept. 20, 2021, the plaintiffs agree to dismiss all claims and allegations in exchange for compensation.
A total sum of $510,00 will be split and attorney fees will be paid to the former seven student employees, the settlement documents say.
The complaint for damages alleges that Patino, a full-time bookstore employee supervisor, engaged in non-consensual touching and made sexualized comments toward the former employees and to other young female students shopping in the Owl Bookstore and Café.
“Patino used his cell phone to take photographs and video up the skirts of minor female students who came into the bookstore,” court documents say.
Attorneys Raymond Boucher, Brian Bush, Marilyn Bednarski and David McLane, who represented the seven former student employees, did not respond to phone calls for comment.
On Oct. 27, 2015, in an incident that led up to the termination of Patino, a student employee reported to another student employee that she had seen Patino taking upskirt photos of students in the bookstore, according to the complaint.
The complaint says this report was taken to human resources after the student employee was told by her supervisor, Magallon, there was nothing he could do and they should go to human resources.
The seven female bookstore employees said Citrus College, and specifically those full-time employees who worked closely with Patino was dismissive of what was reported and disregarded their verbal complaint.
Magallon allegedly told the other female employees they were “blowing this out of proportion,” according to the complaint.
A student employee had previously reported Patino’s actions to then bookstore supervisor Todd Wilcox in the spring of 2014. No repercussions or mandatory sexual harassment training occurred, according to the legal complaint.
The students interviewed told the civil rights office they did not receive any sexual harassment training and were not aware of how to file a complaint.
Nothing was posted in the bookstore regarding the employee’s Title IX rights, according to the civil rights office report.
The complaint says Director of Fiscal Services Rosie Buchwald, at a meeting on an unspecified date in late 2015 for full-time bookstore employees, said in reference to the reports “kids will be kids” and the full-time employees “should be respectful of Patino’s wife,” who was also a bookstore employee.
Patino was charged with 19 misdemeanor counts of invasion of privacy and disorderly conduct in connection to secret filming. He was found guilty on Feb. 22, 2016, on six of the 19 charges, court documents say.
Patino was sentenced to serve 200 days in jail and five years of probation while also having to register as a sex offender, court documents say.
Patino’s defense attorneys, Steven Haney and Kenneth Baish, did not respond to phone calls for comment.
The complaint says the civil rights office conducted an investigation into the allegations made at Citrus. Citrus receives federal funding, which subjects them to Title IX regulation. Title IX prohibits discrimination regarding sex in programs and activities.
The agency determined Patino’s actions were “severe” due to them “consisting of unlawful photographing of female body parts without permission and physical touching,” the complaint says.
Court documents allege that Patino would adjust the female students’ shirts, input pet names that were visible to all staff into their timecards, suggest lewd acts when student employees would blow up balloons and made inappropriate jokes and sexual gestures toward the female student employees.
According to Citrus’ board policy on sexual harassment, Title IX information regarding sexual harassment should be posted in a location where employees can access it.
The report by the civil rights office found none of the students interviewed knew what a Title IX coordinator was.
The students were unaware that the college had grievance procedures to address sexual harassment and assault in the work environment, the civil rights report said.
Two bookstore employees who worked for the college for over 10 years told the agency they had never received sexual harassment training. They were not sure how to assist other employees and were unaware of a Title IX coordinator on campus, according to the report.
Brenda Fink is the Title IX coordinator at Citrus College. Fink did not respond to emails and phone calls for comment.
The complaint says the first time students were provided any information on Citrus’ sexual harassment policies was on Dec. 1, 2015, when Sammis and Arvid Spor, former vice president of student services, met to tell them Patino was fired.
The report says that Citrus was responsible for Patino’s harassment regardless of actual notice of action due to failure to provide mandatory training and regular training to employees.
An internal investigation at Citrus by Sammis found Patino engaged in sexual harassment and created a sexually hostile work environment, court documents say.
The complaint filed in 2017 alleges that Sammis and Magallon acted with deliberate indifference and reckless disregard.
“The seven student employees have suffered great mental and physical pain, suffering, anguish, fright, nervousness, anxiety, shock, humiliation, indignity, embarrassment and apprehension,” court documents say.
