Two Washoe County Sheriff’s Office detectives are suing the Reno Police Department. In late August, they added Mayor Hillary Schieve, Council members Naomi Duerr and Jenny Brekhus, and former Council member Neoma Jardon to their lawsuit. They allege sexual harassment and discrimination by a Reno Police sergeant while at a 2021 conference in Las Vegas.
Apryl McElroy and Jessica Troup filed a federal lawsuit claiming Reno Police Sergeant Paul Sifre made sexually explicit comments and gestures toward them while they were at the Nevada Narcotics Officers Association conference. The three were part of a regional drug task force with multiple agencies working together, and they are represented by attorney Jack Campbell, who used to work as a City of Reno attorney.
Council members Duerr and Brekhus said they would not comment on the lawsuit. Schieve and Jardon did not respond to This Is Reno. The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court of Nevada, named Sifre and former Reno Police Chief Jason Soto as defendants. However, the mayor and three city council members were added as defendants after a series of anonymous emails were produced as part of the lawsuit.
Those emails, sent from two different Proton Mail accounts, expressed concern about Police Chief Soto. They said Soto did not meet the qualifications to be chief after he was appointed in 2018; based on reporting by the Reno Gazette Journal, Soto had to have a bachelor’s degree to qualify for the position. He only had an associate’s degree when Schieve and the council appointed him, but he was told he had two years to meet the qualifications for the position.
The council members were sent emails raising concerns about what the senders said was a lack of accountability at RPD. Records show Duerr and Brekhus responded.
“I appreciate your effort to reach out and inform the City Council of your concerns,” Duerr wrote back to one email in 2018. “I will definitely consider your input as we move forward.”
Brekhus responded to an email citing concerns about problem RPD officers not facing accountability. “I have discussed these with our city manager and have also requested an opportunity for me to interview IA personnel about the outcome of their inquiry,” Brekhus responded to one email. She also said a grand jury may have the authority to investigate the agency.
“The complaint makes no other allegations of any type of harassing behavior despite the fact that these individuals had been working together for years prior to these alleged incidents.”
The whistleblowers alleged RPD supervisors were “feeling like Soto is not holding officers accountable,” and “[Internal Affairs] reports directly to him which is a departure from past Chiefs.” That was in 2017.
McElroy and Troup allege Sifre made sexually explicit comments toward them in 2021. “These acts were done in front of other members of the [Regional Narcotics Unit] and were insulting, demeaning and were intended to sexually harass both McElroy and Troup,” the lawsuit states.
The suit alleges that internal affairs investigated Sifre several times, but he allegedly was not disciplined. “Sifre repeatedly bragged to the other members of RNU that he had been investigated by Reno Police Department’s Internal Affairs Department more than a dozen times and was never punished or disciplined because of his close relationship with Police Chief Soto,” Campbell states in the complaint.
The anonymous emails to the council and mayor, starting in 2017, also raised concerns about Sifre—well before the incident with McElroy and Troup. The emails disclosed similar issues to the lawsuit: Internal Affairs complaints were not followed by discipline.
“Following the reporting of Sifre’s sexual harassment, Reno, through the RPD Internal Affairs Division, conducted an investigation and confirmed that [he] had engaged in improper and illegal sexual harassment, which created a hostile work environment for both McElroy and Troup,” the lawsuit states.
“Nevertheless, Soto, Reno, and RPD intentionally delayed the completion of the Internal Affairs investigation to allow Sifre to enjoy a contractual increase of benefits and facilitated Sifre obtaining a medical disability retirement, which provides greater retirement benefits [than] Sifre’s performance and tenure earned.”
A source told This Is Reno that Sifre was placed on administrative leave as a result of the IA investigation, but doing so at the time “was probably going to cost the city since [the] victims [were outside of RPD] and who are reportedly retaining Jack Campbell. Soto previously disbanded the discipline review board to protect Sifre when they recommended termination, so it will be interesting to see how he protects him this time.”
Sifre, through his attorney, denied all the allegations and argued that the statements did not constitute harassment or a hostile work environment. “These are the only allegations made in the complaint that directly involve alleged actions taken by Mr. Sifre,” Dreher wrote. “These allegations are limited to a period of two days in 2021, when Plaintiffs and Mr. Sifre were at a law enforcement conference in Las Vegas.
“The complaint makes no other allegations of any type of harassing behavior despite the fact that these individuals had been working together for years prior to these alleged incidents,” he added.
Dreher called Sifre’s statements “mere utterances at most,” which were not frequent, pervasive or threatening.
City officials said they would not comment on the case, but City of Reno attorneys also wrote in court documents that Sifre’s conduct was not “sufficiently severe or pervasive to create a hostile work environment.” They also said the detectives included internal affairs documents in their lawsuit against RPD “to … gratify their personal spite held against Defendant Sifre.”
CORRECTION: Sifre has denied all allegations, contrary to the original report.
