BRENTWOOD — A former Brentwood police officer has filed a lawsuit alleging that her superior sexually assaulted her at an out-of-state conference and that the police department tried to pressure her to drop her complaint.

The woman, who this news organization is not naming, contends former Lt. Sal DiMercurio raped her inside a hotel room in Reno, Nevada, where they were both attending a training conference by the California Association of Hostage Negotiators. City officials say DiMercurio retired from the force on Feb. 9, two days after the lawsuit was filed.

“I hoped that he would be held accountable,” the woman said in an interview. “I was extremely disappointed with the city’s investigation.”

During his career, DiMercurio was a well-known officer around Brentwood who served as the department’s investigations lieutenant, frequently handling media inquiries.

“Mr. DiMercurio adamantly denies the allegations made in the civil complaint,” said Shane Larsen, an attorney with law firm Jackson Lewis, which is representing DiMercurio. “However, due to the ongoing litigation, he cannot provide further comment at this time.”

The suit accuses DiMercurio of having “a history of workplace sexual harassment and misconduct” and says two other high-ranking officers — Chief Tom Hansen and Captain Benjamin Tolero — opened a “supervisory inquiry” instead of an internal affairs investigation when the woman reported to higher-ups that she had been raped.

“This kind of a classic ‘me too’ situation, we once again see a woman get taken advantage of by a man in power,” the woman’s attorney, J. Gary Gwilliam, said in a recent interview. “She knew perfectly well if she took on Lt. DiMercurio she was taking on the whole police department and it would likely jeopardize her career. It turned out that’s exactly what happened.”

In a written statement, Brentwood City Manager Gus Vina declined to comment on the allegations directly but said the city takes them “extremely seriously.”

“In order to make sure this matter is handled in the right way, with the appropriate seriousness and consideration, we are not going to litigate it in the press,” Vina said.

City officials say they can’t comment on the woman’s complaint, and records related to it are unlikely to be made public. The state’s new police transparency law, SB 1421, only releases records of sustained sexual assault complaints against cops if the assault was against a civilian, not a colleague.

The woman is a longtime officer with nearly 20 years of experience and a onetime member of the department’s crisis negotiation team, which DiMercurio headed. The lawsuit says that in September 2017, she, DiMercurio and a third officer went to the conference in Reno and checked into a hotel.

On the first night, DiMercurio asked her to come to his room. When she did, she found “DiMercurio in bed, without a shirt.” He allegedly grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her toward him, but she told him “no” and left, the suit alleges.

Later that evening, DiMercurio told the woman to delete unspecified text messages between them. The next day, after the three had dinner and drinks, DiMercurio again invited the woman to his room, the suit alleges.

“She complied because he was her commanding officer and also because she wanted to have a conversation with DiMercurio about the events of the preceding evening,” the suit says. “As DiMercurio had been respectful during dinner, she had no reason to believe that he would again attempt to sexually assault her.”

When she showed up at his room, the suit says DiMercurio blocked the exit, pulled down the woman’s pants and forced her to engage in oral and vaginal sex, “while tightly grabbing her arms, causing bruising.”

During the assault, the woman’s husband called using a video chat app, which caused DiMercurio to “freak out” and hide and order the woman to leave, the suit says.

The next day, the three went shopping at a sporting goods store, where DiMercurio and the other officer asked the woman to take photographs of them pretending to be wearing women’s lingerie, the lawsuit says.

After the trip, the woman “became despondent, withdrawing from her family” and feared for her safety.

In November, her husband discovered the texts between her and DiMercurio and she told DiMercurio she was going to tell him “about the sexual assault,” the suit says. He allegedly became angry and told her to deny it.

“DiMercurio would later claim that he accidentally dropped his cellphone in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta that day, destroying additional evidence,” the suit says.

The woman’s husband says he initially thought she and DiMercurio were having an affair but changed his mind after talking to her in detail.

“When she came forward and disclosed to me what he actually did, I recognized signs that this was not consensual. … I recognized she was a victim,” her husband said in an interview last month.

The woman filed an internal complaint against DiMercurio on Nov. 26, 2017, but said she decided not to pursue criminal charges against him because she feared it would be too much to handle emotionally.

“Psychologically, I’m constantly reminded of what he did. I constantly have triggers and flashbacks,” she said. “I want there to be policy changes, that if a complaint is initially made it is automatically investigated by an outside source.”

The suit says Tolero interviewed her, asking a series of “yes or no” questions designed to confirm DiMercurio’s story that there had been no sexual intercourse and any contact was consensual. It says Tolero was blunt about his intent to protect “the city’s interest.” He also mentioned an upcoming “sergeants review,” implying that she would get promoted if she played along, the lawsuit alleges.

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San Jose drops controversial site but continues pursuit for $43 million police training facility In the ensuing weeks, DiMercurio tried to talk to the woman about what had happened and “repeatedly pressured her to deny that any sexual intercourse occurred,” sometimes showing up when she responded to calls for service while on duty. The woman’s husband says DiMercurio spoke with him, too, and that in one phone call DiMercurio unexpectedly blurted out, “They call me ‘The Untouchable.’ “

The suit says two Brentwood officers showed up unexpectedly at the woman’s home in February 2018, “purportedly to investigate a 911 hang-up call that did not occur.” Two days after the woman filed a legal claim against the city naming DiMercurio, his wife unexpectedly arrived at their home claiming she feared DiMercurio would harm himself.

“He was very intimidating … from the beginning he tried to manipulate her from coming forward and telling the truth,” said Jayme Walker, an attorney with the law offices of Gwilliam, Ivary, Chiosso, Cavalli & Brewer, which is representing the woman.