The Brief

When Deanna Gomez found out she was pregnant in September 2023, it turned her world on end.

She was a college senior in San Bernardino and didn’t feel ready to have a baby. She was working two jobs, doing well in her classes, and she was on track to graduate in December.

She used birth control. Motherhood was not in the plan. Not yet.

She decided her best option was a medication abortion. It’s a two-step process: One pill, taken at a doctor’s office; another pill a day later to induce cramping and bleeding and empty her uterus.

She ended up driving more than 300 miles to three medical offices and paying hundreds of dollars in medical and travel expenses. She missed a month of classes, which put her graduation date from Cal State San Bernardino in jeopardy.

She had no idea she was entitled to a free medication abortion right on campus.

An LAist investigation has found that one year after California became the first state to require its public universities to provide the abortion pill to students, basic information on where or how students can obtain the medication is lacking and, often, nonexistent.

“I was really upset when I found out,” Gomez told LAist. “I had to really push myself to make that money happen.”

LAist found that nearly half of CSU campus clinics do not have any information about medication abortion on their clinic websites, nor do they list it as a service offered. Of University of California’s 10 campuses, eight mention abortion on their clinic websites.

Outside of the Cal State Northridge student health center.

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Through conversations with students and faculty at multiple campuses, LAist found that many universities haven’t told students that the abortion pill is available to them. Having that information would likely reduce stress for many pregnant people dealing with unwanted pregnancies and give them more autonomy and control over the process.

“They say they are trying to be part of the solution, but they're not,” Gomez said of campus leadership. “They're becoming part of the problem.”

‘This law is more important than ever’

In 2019, California legislators introduced Senate Bill 24, which would require all of the state’s 33 public universities to provide the abortion pill on campus.

That year was one of the most contentious on record in the nation’s ongoing debate about abortion rights. California and eight other states moved to protect and expand abortion access. Legislators in 17 other states moved to restrict it.

“We wanted to make sure that students, female students, had access to this right,” said Connie Leyva, the former Pomona-area state senator who authored the bill.

Students who have a child while in college are less likely to graduate than those that do not, according to research based on federal data.

California’s Legislature created a $10.2 million fund of privately raised money to help universities implement the new law. Each campus received $200,000 in one-time funding to pay for the medication and cover costs such as facility upgrades, equipment, training, telehealth services, and security upgrades.

(Leyva said community colleges weren’t included in the requirement because “most” of them do not have health services on campus.)

The funding did not include any requirement that campus clinics inform students the medication was available to them.

Leyva said she doesn’t recall any conversations about “including something on advertising that you could get a medicated abortion on campus.” That said, she added, “it definitely wasn't ever taken out of the bill.”

Until recently, San Bernardino was one of 11 California State Universities that did not list medical abortion as a service available on campus to the student body.

A spokesperson said UC President Michael Drake was not available to comment.

“The student communities at each UC campus are unique,” said Heather Harper, the spokesperson for UC Health in Drake’s office, via email. “As a result, communication to students at each location takes different forms and may include website content, flyers, emails, person-to-person conversations or other methods.”

The office of CSU Chancellor Mildred García did not reply to a request for comment.

‘I did not want to be pregnant’

In January 2021 — two years before SB 24 would go into effect — Diana Venegas was three semesters away from graduating from Cal State Northridge. Venegas took a pregnancy test and it came out positive.

“I started crying because I did not want to be pregnant at all,” they told LAist.

Venegas jumped on the phone to find where to obtain medication abortion.

“And then I continued crying because I looked at the cost,” Venegas said, recalling that the estimate at the time would have been around $200, not including transportation expenses.

Venegas worked as a resident advisor in the college dorms, which provided free housing. But, they said, their monthly budget was tight.

Diana Venegas, a graduate of California State University Northridge, who currently works towards advocating for abortion rights.

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“I love my abortion. It saved my life in a million ways," they said. But Venegas had a lot of difficulty along the way, in part because of a lack of resources they could turn to.

"It just sucked that nobody was there to celebrate one of the best things that I've done in my life,” they said.

Venegas now works in the public health field as a clinical researcher. They also work as an abortion doula through the Los Angeles Abortion Support Collective.

Who the law was designed for

Venegas was the kind of student SB 24 was designed to help. So was Deanna Gomez.

Gomez found out she was pregnant in September. The new law was already in place.

For her, the timing of the pregnancy couldn’t have been worse. She was working up to 60 hours a week at two jobs, while taking a full class load. With a December graduation approaching, she was weeks away from becoming the first person in her family to earn a bachelor's degree.

At this point in her life, she said, she couldn’t provide for a child.

A glimpse into the notes that Diana Venegas took about her abortion and how they are using that experience to help advocate for others.

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“I grew up in poverty,” Gomez explained. “It’s something that you remember and I don’t want that for my children.”

Had she been aware that she could have accessed services at the campus clinic, she would have done it without question, she said.

“I was under the impression the clinic was for basic health needs, like when you need a flu shot, when you need a physical. Because that’s how it was explained to me,” she said.

Gomez transferred from community college to Cal State San Bernardino in 2022. She attended the university’s orientation that year. She said she doesn’t recall any mention of the abortion pill being available to students on campus the following January.

Because Gomez had private health insurance through her parents, she had never gone to the campus clinic for care.

'We need to work harder and better'

Even if Gomez had checked the clinic website, she wouldn’t have known abortion pills were available.

Beth Jaworski, Cal State San Bernardino’s executive director of health, counseling, and wellness, acknowledged medication abortion is not on the clinic website, saying “it’s not an exhaustive list of everything we provide.”

She said students can see that information when they log into the patient portal. LAist was unable to independently verify her statement. She also mentioned that information is posted in patient rooms and clinic restrooms.

Medication abortion isn’t noted on any of the posters on the clinic doors, in the lobby or pharmacy, or around campus. Jaworski said providers and nurses are trained to discuss — “and are expected to discuss” — all pregnancy options.

Jaworski said the campus clinic has provided medication abortions in compliance with the law through a telehealth service. She would not disclose a specific number other than to say “single digits.”

“I absolutely think we need to work harder and better if there is a student who needed the service and wasn't aware that they could access it through us and not have to pay for it,” Jaworski said.

She said she doubts there are many students who have missed out, and she doesn’t think the lack of information limits access.

“It's one student,” she said, referring to Gomez. “We haven't been providing the service very long. It's been just about a year now.”

Jaworski said medication abortion was referenced in health center presentations that students could attend — which were scheduled during hours without classes — and also in social media posts and the school bulletin. She did not provide examples to LAist.

After the interview with LAist, medication abortion appeared on the CSU San Bernardino health clinic website as a service the university offered.

Falling behind

Not knowing that free medication abortions were offered on campus, Gomez figured her best bet for getting care would be the nearest Planned Parenthood in Upland. She said she found the interaction with a staff member there unwelcoming so instead drove to another location, more than an hour away in Pasadena. (LAist reached out to the Upland office but was unable to connect with someone in time for publication.)

When Gomez arrived for her appointment in Pasadena, she was met by anti-abortion protesters holding signs near the parking lot.

“They were saying, ‘You don’t love Jesus, you’re going to hell,'" Gomez said. “I don’t think I’m going to hell. I don’t think forcing myself to have a child that I know I can’t provide [for] makes me a bad person.”

Gomez paid $575 for the exam and medication, and took the first pill while at the Pasadena Planned Parenthood.

She took the second drug at work the next day, during her lunch break. Days later, she continued to feel nauseated. Exhausted from the 60-hour workweek, she skipped classes. She missed nearly all of her classes in October, she said.

“I attended maybe one or two classes, and that really put me behind,” she said.

At a checkup a month later, Gomez discovered she was still pregnant.

“I asked the nurse, ‘Do you know why it wasn’t successful? I did everything I was supposed to,’ and she said, ‘they are 96% successful.’”

Gomez decided not to try another medication abortion. Staff at Planned Parenthood in Pasadena told her she’d have to pay an additional $575 for another round of medication, and she didn’t trust it to work.

Instead, Gomez opted for a dilation and curettage, or D&C, an outpatient procedure that clears pregnancy tissue from the uterus. She wasn’t charged, because it was part of her ongoing care, but the only available appointment was at another Planned Parenthood location in Baldwin Park, more than 40 miles from her home in the San Bernardino area.

Gomez worked overtime shifts to make up for lost pay and said two of her professors insisted on receiving doctor’s notes before giving her more time to do her assignments.

If she had been treated on campus she would have saved hundreds of dollars and dozens of hours of lost travel time. And there was a toll on her state of mind.

“Emotionally, it would have taken a lot of stress off of me,” she said.

She also likely would have avoided protestors. University campuses restrict protests to specific times and places, away from dorms and the campus health clinic.

Big gaps in communication

LAist’s survey of campuses that did post information about medication abortion found significant variation. Those different approaches, some students and faculty said, may signal what’s important to university leaders.

Some campuses placed information about medication abortion on the main page of their respective student health center’s websites. Others did not.

At Cal Poly Pomona, information on the process is three clicks away from the health center’s main page, starting with a dropdown of health topics. Rita O’Neill, director of the student health center, said the university tries to balance essential health care and politics.

“I think we wanted to just approach it very thoughtfully so that we could provide good, high touch, empathetic, compassionate care,” she said, “with the recognition also that there may be some controversy with some people around this area of care.”

O’Neill said staff at the center have talked about medication abortion and other reproductive health services in gatherings with members of the campus cultural centers. She has not seen an all-campus email from administrators that mentions the availability of medication abortion.

“The more intimate safe space that you can create, the more impact you can have for students,” she said.

On some websites, no mention of medication abortion

UC Santa Cruz has a webpage for pregnancy options. The site does not mention that state law requires the university to provide medication abortion.

Campus spokesperson Scott Hernandez-Jason said in an email that the university is working to update the website. “In the meantime, we are continuing to provide outreach to students about the services we offer via a variety of channels,” he said.

UC Merced’s website also doesn’t mention medication abortion on its website. Spokesperson Sam Yniguez said the health center notifies students about services in a variety of ways, including peer education, tabling events, fliers, and social media posts.

“Students also learn about health resources available during orientation,” Yniguez said.

In contrast, Cal State Fullerton’s website notes that medication abortion is a provided service and explains the process.

But getting that information on the website took a push from faculty on campus who knew about the requirement, according to Karyl Ketchum, the Women and Gender Studies department chair. She said the information was not available on the website when the law went into effect last year.

Students walking in the rain at Cal State Northridge.

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“I saw no preparation for this around campus at all. There was certainly no discussion of it in the Academic Senate at all, zero,” Ketchum said. The Academic Senate is the representative body that debates matters of teaching and learning.

She said the information was added to the site three months later.

“[Outreach] would be happening in the women’s center,” Ketchum said, but the university closed it in 2022 with no warning. Cal State Fullerton did not respond to a request for comment.

Is the law fulfilling its promise?

In 2018, a study in the Journal of Adolescent Health found that more than 500 women at public universities seek a medication abortion every month in California.

State data released in December reported that UC and CSU campus clinics provided just 365 medication abortions in the first six months after the law went into effect.

Those numbers raise questions, including to what extent public universities are underserving students' medication abortion needs.

The University of California system enrolls more than 155,000 women. Between July 2022 and June of last year, UC campus clinics provided 203 medication abortions.

The California State University system enrolls more than 457,000 students (261,000 women). CSU’s 23 campus clinics provided 162 medication abortions. Asked why they might not have provided more when studies suggest there should be higher demand, campus staff pointed to outside factors.

“I think that there are many students who are having abortions who are still not coming to our center,” said Susan Flaming Yeats, director of the student health center at Cal State Dominguez Hills.

She said there are multiple abortion providers around the South L.A. County campus. Three centers that provide abortion pills are located within six miles of Cal State Dominguez Hills.

She also said students who want a medication abortion may not want to be seen walking into the student health center.

Flaming Yeats said her center provided six medication abortions in the one year that the law has been in place.

Her center needs to do more outreach, she said, and that would include talking to academic deans so that the information can trickle down to faculty and students.

Flaming Yates said there are a lot more students they could serve, and "that marketing piece is going to be pretty critical for us.”

Former lawmaker urges a fix

Leyva, the former senator and author of SB 24, said the law is “falling short” of what was intended when Gov. Gavin Newsom signed it into law.

“I would love to see someone who's still in the legislature take that up and make it a requirement that the schools have to provide the information so that the students know,” Leyva added. “That way they know they have access.”

Student health center medical staff — who can opt out of providing medication abortion care — say the law directed them to provide a service they’d never provided before.

“This is not something that these practitioners have ever done… and it's not because these people don't believe in this,” Yeats said.

Yeats said she stressed to her Cal State Dominguez Hills health center team that providing medication abortion would improve access to health care for students.

“We know that our students are getting abortions, the numbers tell us that,” she said. “We know our students don't have easy access to transportation, it's a barrier for them to get to these other places for this service.”

Not so secret

Gomez graduated in December with a degree in sociology. But it didn’t need to be so difficult. She’s angry at her alma mater, and feels administrators are keeping the abortion pills a secret.

Gomez thinks fliers, posters, emails, and Instagram posts, directed toward both faculty and students, would go a long way.

“You want to market the football games. You want to market the volleyball games,” she said. “Why is that important and abortions are not?”

Illustration by Alborz Kamalizad/LAist.

President Donald Trump is canceling nearly $1 billion in spending approved by Congress, the White House announced on Friday, using a rare and contested power to axe funding for immigrant services and diversity-focused initiatives.

Trump’s Office of Management and Budget described the funding cut as focused on “the most harmful government spending.”

Most of the cuts are focused on services for immigrants, including nonprofits that serve refugees and unaccompanied minors accused of being in the country illegally. The administration says the funds are no longer necessary because illegal border crossings have diminished considerably.

A White House press release announcing the funding rescissions notes that some of the organizations are led by people who worked in the administration of Democratic President Barack Obama.

Trump’s move was condemned by Sen. Susan Collins, a Republican in a tough re-election campaign and chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee.

Collins said in a statement that the action came without warning or consultation. She also said she would work to address with colleagues “these illegal actions.”

“Not only is the delay itself an impoundment that was not reported to Congress, but also it is a usurpation of Congress’s appropriations powers,” Collins said. “OMB is an agency of the executive branch. It does not get to decide which programs are worth funding.”

Typically, Congress can review the president’s proposed spending cuts before they take effect. But Trump made that all but impossible by announcing them with just five days left in the federal fiscal year. The Government Accountability Office says the maneuver, known as a “pocket rescission,” is illegal.

Collins called it the latest attempt by OMB to “undermine Congress’s Constitutional power of the purse.”

A hedge fund manager who wants more bike lanes and a construction workers' union are the biggest donors in L.A. city elections over the past two months.

They put a total of $7 million behind City Councilmember Nithya Raman’s run for mayor, according to the latest campaign filings submitted by Thursday to meet a state deadline.

Aaron Sosnick, a hedge fund founder, and the construction workers union — the Western States Regional Council of Carpenters — each gave $3 million to the same committee backing Raman, city filings show. Sosnick gave another $1 million to the pro–Raman political committee of the street-safety group Streets for All.

Airbnb has pumped in more than $4 million into backing Mayor Karen Bass and three other city candidates. The filings also show the LAPD officers' union has spent nearly $3 million, money that went to oppose Raman, city attorney candidate Marissa Roy and city council candidate Estuardo Mazariegos, and to support council candidate Tim Gaspar. Most of that Airbnb and police union spending was before the June primary election, though police union spending against Raman has picked up recently.

Overall, the filings show Raman’s significant earlier disadvantage in outside dollars has narrowed significantly in recent weeks. So far, the amount of ad spending by outside groups for the general election is similar between the two candidates, with a total of $1.57 million supporting Bass and against Raman, versus $1.53 million supporting Raman and against Bass. Those groups still have millions of donor dollars on hand for future ads.

Ballots are set to start hitting voters’ mailboxes by the week of Oct. 5.

What to know about the mayor’s race

Sosnick runs the New York-based hedge fund A.R.T. Advisors, which uses computer programs to quickly buy and sell stock, to make money from short-term price changes. He is based in Reno, according to campaign filings, and splits his time between New York and L.A.’s Los Feliz neighborhood, according to Michael Schneider, Streets for All’s founder.

Sosnick has been a major donor to prior streets-focused campaigns in L.A., including 2024’s Measure HLA. That voter-approved initiative requires the city to add planned bike lanes, bus lanes and pedestrian upgrades when it repaves major streets.

Two years after voters approved it, the city had completed only about 300 feet of HLA improvements as of March, Streetsblog L.A. reported at the time. The city paused some repaving and shifted to smaller repairs that stay under the measure's trigger, Streetsblog reported.

The construction workers union — which has said most of its nearly 100,000 members are in Southern California — endorsed Bass in 2022, before switching to Raman in August. The union broke with Bass over her affordable-housing directive, ED1, which doesn't require union wages.

Another donor to pro-Raman ads, through the Streets for All committee, is real estate developer Todd Wexman, who gave $50,000. Last year the state issued a $2.3 million wage theft fine to him and other developers over allegations about 124 construction workers.

The LAPD officers' union has put more than $2 million into groups opposing Raman. A recent ad funded by the union highlights Raman’s remarks about opposing a city ban on homeless encampments near schools. In the ad, Raman is shown saying she doesn’t "think a kid’s gonna be safer because a tent is 500 feet away from a school."

The police union committee also received $525,000 from Douglas Emmett Inc., the landlord behind the largest attempted eviction from rent-controlled housing in the city in decades. The city declined to legally intervene on behalf of the renters, who ended up suing and winning a 2024 court ruling that found the evictions were illegal.

Airbnb has given more than $4 million to groups backing Bass, city attorney candidate John McKinney and City Council candidates Jose Ugarte and Gaspar. The city attorney's office has a current lawsuit against Airbnb over alleged price gouging after the January 2025 fires. Whoever wins in November will inherit the case. This year, Bass advanced a proposal backed by Airbnb to relax city regulations by letting Airbnb hosts rent out second homes and investment properties through 2028.

Dodger Stadium parking-lot co-owner Frank McCourt's real estate firm also gave $25,000 to a group backing Bass. McCourt needs approvals from the Metro board, which Bass chairs, for a proposed gondola project.

Much of Bass' other outside support comes from unions, including the SEIU union that represents most city government staff, whose pay is negotiated by the mayor and approved by the city council.

City attorney

Beyond $2 million from an Airbnb-backed committee supporting McKinney, the police union’s committee has spent $357,000 against city attorney candidate Roy.

Smart Justice California, a criminal-justice-reform advocacy group that wants to reduce incarceration, and a group of trial lawyers are major backers of a committee supporting Roy. The city attorney oversees the city’s misdemeanor prosecutions and defends the city against lawsuits, including those brought by plaintiffs' firms.

City Council: Gaspar and Ugarte far ahead in outside money

In Council District 3, Gaspar’s biggest outside supporters include about $550,000 from an Airbnb-backed group, around $230,000 from a major association for apartment landlords and $136,000 from the police union. His opponent, Barri Worth Girvan, has received a much smaller amount of outside backing, largely from unions, including one that represents construction workers.

In Council District 9, outside spending for Ugarte includes about $300,000 by Airbnb and about $230,000 by the landlords association. Among their many responsibilities, the city council votes on rent rules.

Ugarte’s opponent, Estuardo Mazariegos, has received much less outside support, largely from the main union for L.A. Unified School District teachers and a tenant organizing group known as ACCE.

How the biggest donations flow

Direct giving to the candidates’ campaigns is legally restricted to $1,800 per donor each election cycle for L.A. mayor and city attorney, and $1,000 for city council. So the biggest donors instead spend through “independent expenditure” committees, or “IEs.” Donors can give unlimited amounts to these committees, as long as the spending isn't coordinated with the candidates' campaigns.

That IE money often flows through multiple committees — many of which combine money meant for candidates in multiple races — on its way to election ads, which can make the money hard for the public to easily track.

The general election will take place Nov. 3.

The City of Long Beach is pushing back against requests to release information about a sustained misconduct finding from the personnel file of one of its former officers — even as more details come out about past incidents.

Defense attorney Scott Sanders has requested material in the personnel files of former Long Beach Police Officer Erik Suarez after he learned Suarez was convicted on aggravated battery charges stemming from a 2019 beating in Cobb County, Georgia.

In court filings, Sanders has argued that information should have been disclosed to his client, Lonnie Jacobs, from the outset of the case. Jacobs is facing up to four years in prison on a charge that he brought a controlled substance into a jail. Sanders has argued the case should be dismissed because he alleges the initial arrest was based on Suarez misrepresenting facts and omitting evidence.

Now the defense has requested information from Suarez’s personnel file about both the Georgia conviction and an allegation that Suarez assaulted a man on the job in 2023. Sanders argues that information in the personnel file could show a pattern of misconduct by Suarez. In court filings, he also claims it could reveal a practice within the Long Beach Police Department to conceal incriminating information about its officers in protected personnel files.

“The reasonable conclusion is that the non-disclosure of Officer Suarez’s conduct and conviction is illustrative of an intentionally flawed process designed to conceal evidence that is favorable to defendants and harmful to LBPD officers,” Sanders wrote in a declaration submitted to the court on Sept. 23.

“With what we've learned so far, every defendant charged in a Long Beach case must presume that evidence is being concealed in their case,” Sanders told LAist. “Just look at the lengths the department went to in order to protect Officer Suarez's misconduct. He was arrested after violently causing serious injuries to the victim. Then just three months after being convicted in that case, he used force while on duty that the department found impermissible. Long Beach PD's response? Send him back to the streets and block defendants from finding out the truth.”

Erik Suarez from a photo in a Long Beach police file documenting his use of force during an arrest in 2023.

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Suarez left the Long Beach Police Department in June and is now with the Burbank Police Department, according to records from the California Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training.

The Burbank Police Department confirmed that Suarez was employed there and assigned to the field operations division. The department said it could not comment on “confidential personnel records or specific aspects of an individual’s background investigation, employment history, disciplinary history, or other personnel matters” and declined to make him available for an interview.

LAist tried to reach Suarez by calling a phone number linked to him in public records. Each time, a man answered and said he was not Suarez, but that he was in contact with Suarez. This week, that man said he had no interest in passing along the reporter's contact information.

Todd Vigus, an attorney for the Long Beach Police Department, argued in a Sept. 22 response to Sanders’ motion that the allegations surrounding Jacobs’ arrest “do not establish good cause to search the officers' personnel files for every conceivable form of misconduct, moral turpitude, discipline, performance deficiency, racial bias, or unrelated wrongdoing.”

A spokesperson for the Long Beach Police Department said in an email dated Sept. 11 that they are prohibited from discussing personnel matters and internal investigations, but did confirm that the department was aware of Suarez’s arrest in Georgia.

In response to a records request from LAist, department officials on Thursday released records from a 2023 use of force investigation that determined Suarez used "unnecessary or unreasonable force" while arresting someone.

That same year, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s office investigated an allegation that Suarez committed “assault under the color of authority” but declined to press charges.

“The decision to decline prosecution in the 2023 matter was based on the evidence available at the time,” said Greg Risling, a spokesperson for the district attorney’s office. “Although we did not know of the allegation from Georgia, the facts of that case would not have been a deciding factor in that charging decision.”

How Suarez's record came to light

When Suarez left the LBPD in June, Sanders was attempting to subpoena him for questioning about why he arrested Jacobs, who is bald, when his body-worn camera footage showed a witness describing the person who threatened him with a gun as having dreadlocks or braids.

Sanders attempted to subpoena Suarez twice through the Long Beach Police Department. In response to the first subpoena, in April 2026, the department said Suarez was out of the country. After the second subpoena filed June 22, the department informed Sanders that Suarez had resigned.

According to state records, Burbank hired Suarez two weeks later, on July 6. He’d worked for the Long Beach Police Department from November 2017 until June 19, 2026 — three days before Sanders made a second subpoena attempt.

Still attempting to subpoena Suarez, now at his home, an investigator working for the defense of Lonnie Jacobs — the man Sanders represents in the drug case — found Suarez had been convicted of misdemeanor aggravated battery in 2022 in Cobb County, Georgia.

According to court records LAist obtained from Georgia, the incident took place in a Waffle House in 2019.

The victim told the Long Beach Press-Telegram that Suarez threatened to kill him while beating him on the ground. The victim said he has vertigo and problems with his vision from the beating, according to the newspaper.

The Cobb County District Attorney’s office charged Suarez with two felony counts of aggravated battery. In 2022, Suarez pleaded guilty to misdemeanor aggravated battery. He served a year on probation and was ordered to take an anger management class.

According to the article, the victim said he was told by Georgia prosecutors that Long Beach police officials had been informed of the charges, and was surprised to see that Suarez was still working for the police department years later.

Records released by the Long Beach Police Department show Suarez received a two-day suspension for bringing discredit to the department by leaving the scene of the assault without reporting it.

Former Long Beach Police Officer Erik Suarez received a two-day suspension after the 2019 arrest in Cobb County, Georgia.

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Sanders argues in his filing that these details support the motion to open up Suarez’s police records. In California, police personnel files are mostly shielded from public disclosure, except under certain circumstances, including findings of unnecessary use of force and misconduct while on the job.

Defendants who believe those personnel files may include information relevant to their case can file what’s called a Pitchess motion in court. If a judge agrees with the motion, the court will have an opportunity to review personnel files and pull out information deemed relevant to the case at hand.

Sanders filed an initial Pitchess motion before a preliminary hearing, but the court denied his request. He filed another motion to disclose Suarez’s personnel files once the defense learned about the Georgia conviction. Long Beach filed in opposition to that motion, arguing information in Suarez’s personnel file is not relevant to the Jacobs’ case. It is that motion that a judge is considering now.

Why this case could have broader implications

Sanders argues the Georgia conviction should have been disclosed not through a Pitchess motion, but proactively under Brady v. Maryland, a 1963 Supreme Court case that established prosecutors’ obligation to disclose information that could help defendants win their case. In his motions, Sanders is asking not only for information about Suarez’s conviction and potential misconduct, but for evidence that the Long Beach Police Department employs a similar tactic to hide information about other officers in their personnel files.

“Quite clearly, there can be no safe haven within a police department that is created to facilitate the concealment of improper acts by its officers or to hide the department’s efforts to protect officers from receiving deserved consequences,” Sanders wrote in a Sept. 23 supplement to the second Pitchess motion. “It is a near-certainty that the department is engaging in a pervasive practice of non-disclosure.”

On Thursday, a judge in Long Beach granted a continuance in the case against Jacobs, rescheduling the hearing for the second Pitchess motion for Nov. 12.

What the DA knew — and didn’t know

Shortly after Sanders began defending Jacobs, a deputy district attorney on the case notified the defense that the DA’s office investigated Suarez in 2023 for “assault under the color of authority,” but did not file charges.

In his latest filing, Sanders argues this disclosure suggests that the district attorney’s office was aware of its obligations to disclose evidence under Brady and would have disclosed the Georgia conviction if they knew about it.

The district attorney’s office handbook instructs prosecutors to turn over evidence that directly opposes guilt or could be used to impeach a witness, including felony convictions, misdemeanors or other conduct that “reflects on believability, misconduct involving moral turpitude.”

A charge evaluation worksheet submitted to the court provides some details about the 2023 incident but, according to Sanders, leaves other questions unanswered.

The worksheet says that Suarez was assisting other officers responding to a domestic violence call in 2023. The other officers had arrested and handcuffed a man who, according to the worksheet, was “forcefully resisting” arrest. The worksheet says the man bit Suarez. The account reports Suarez then punched the man in the face, and the man lost consciousness for about four minutes. That narrative is based on reports from body-worn camera footage, reports and interviews, the worksheet says.

The district attorney’s office decided not to press charges against Suarez, citing “insufficient evidence” showing Suarez used more force than necessary.

In the latest filing, Sanders raises several issues with the worksheet provided by the district attorney’s office and is seeking more information about what happened during the incident.

The worksheet says Long Beach “opened an investigation into the allegation that Suarez used excessive force” in March 2023, two months after the incident.

In response to a records request from LAist, the Long Beach Police Department said they had identified one investigation with a sustained finding of “unnecessary or unreasonable force” from 2023 in Suarez’s personnel file. Later that same day, the department released the investigatory files related to that incident.

The records show the internal affairs investigation was prompted by deputy chief Gerardo Prieto, who also requested a criminal investigation, and resulted in a three-day suspension for Suarez.

A summary of a meeting between Suarez and LBPD leadership states that Suarez and James Trott, an attorney with the Long Beach Police Officers Association, argued the use of force was reasonable. Trott said the incident “should and alone and not be associated with the prior out-of-state incident,” according to the summary.

The worksheet from the district attorney’s office does not reference any sustained findings by the Long Beach Police Department. It does not describe the allegation or explain where the allegation came from, a key omission, according to Sanders.

The report summarizes an interview with the man Suarez punched. It does not include any statements from that man and explicitly states they did not seek a compelled interview with Suarez.

Importantly, Sanders argues, the report makes no mention of the conviction against Suarez in Georgia that occurred just a few months earlier.

The man Suarez punched was convicted of resisting arrest during the incident. Sanders argues that he was entitled to know about Suarez’s conviction, and that the district attorney’s office should have known about the conviction while deciding whether or not to charge Suarez.

The district attorney’s office handbook states that when considering pressing charges on someone, prosecutors shall “review all available police reports and the accused’s background and prior record.”

“The fact that the accused’s alleged conduct is consistent or inconsistent with prior proven conduct may remove or create a reasonable doubt,” the handbook explains.

The district attorney’s office told LAist the office was not aware of the Georgia conviction at the time of their 2023 investigation.

What makes The Little Sugarplum special? Three sisters started the traveling pop-up bakery, each with a different role in running it. There’s the medical student-turned-baker, the hospitality worker-turned-marketer, and the blackjack dealer-turned-accountant.

What else? Their cinnamon rolls, which have become the main attraction, include a variety of rotating flavors like strawberry shortcake, matcha, coffee and ... mashed potatoes. Yeah, you read that right.

They recently shared their secrets with LAist host Austin Cross.

About the owners

Jenna Agpaoa grew up with her two sisters in Valley Center, a city in San Diego County, where their passion for baked goods began to take shape.

The Amish cinnamon roll

Soon after starting the bakery, their content went viral after sharing a recipe for a traditional Amish cinnamon roll, which notably uses mashed potatoes as an ingredient. They learned the recipe from an old neighbor growing up, who was Pennsylvania Dutch, a group descended from German-speaking immigrants from the 17th and 18th centuries.

Now you can find them vending all across Southern California, including at places like Ubefest and 626 Night Market.

Their fall flavor menu

They offer other baked goods in addition to cinnamon rolls, including cookies, brownies and bread.

The Little Sugarplum's fall menu.

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Courtesy The Little Sugarplum Bakery

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