A former police officer in New Hampshire is suing her former supervisor for sexual harassment, claiming that he ranked women in his community based on their "rapability."
"It was just absolutely disbelief," said Tony Soltani who represents 24-year-old Nashua resident Alex Drake.
According to a 40-page federal lawsuit, Drake alleges that during field training in 2013 as a New Boston Police Officer, her supervisor, Lt. Michael Masella created a so-called "rapability" scale.
"He's talking about rapability of motorists and, 'maybe we should take a person out to the woods and rape her instead of just giving her a ticket,'" Soltani said.
Drake is suing the New Boston Police Department, Lt. Masella, Chief James Brace, and others for gender discrimination and sexual harassment. Drake claims that when she voiced her concerns, she was fired. She's also suing for wrongful termination.
But according to court documents, the town terminated Drake because she admitted to falsifying a police report.
Soltani says Drake was just following orders.
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"They did not do anything about who issued the order," Soltani claimed. "He just happens to have the right genitalia for that police department and that’s wrong."
Nobody within the New Boston Police Department would talk to necn, instead referring us to Town Attorney Donald L. Smith.
In a statement, Smith wrote, "As a policy, the Town of New Boston does not comment on pending litigation. The Town is in the process of preparing a response to the allegations brought forth by Ms. Drake. The Town's response will include that a formal Internal Investigation was conducted by the Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office at the request of Chief Brace in 2015 when the information was brought to his attention. The Town further asserts the complaint contains inaccurate information which will be addressed as part of the ongoing legal process."
Drake says she tried to get a job at the Manchester Police Department but couldn’t because Chief Brace put her on a statewide list of officers with credibility issues.
"We can't do this to people, it's wrong," Soltani said.
Drake says she just wants her name cleared so she can get back into police work, preferably in Manchester.
