She was helping the family of a Madera homicide victim. Now, she’s suspended from her job
Shortly after she raised questions about delays in security upgrades for domestic violence victims in Madera County, Tina Rodriguez has been suspended from her job at Community Action Partnership of Madera County (CAPMC), according to the family of a victim Rodriguez was helping.
Officials with CAPMC declined to comment on the matter.
Russell Ryan, the CAPMC’s attorney, said the organization “does not publicly comment on human resources matters or matters which are or could be subject to potential litigation.”
Rodriguez also declined to comment.
While the reasons for the suspension remained unclear this week, it was the latest development in a series of conflicts involving Rodriguez, CAPMC where Rodriguez works, and Ryan, the attorney representing CAPMC.
All of the conflicts center around the fallout from the killing last year of Calley Jean Garay. A 32-year-old mother of three, Calley Jean Garay, left her husband in May last year and obtained a domestic violence restraining order against him. About three months later, in July, Calley Jean Garay was shot to death outside the Camarena Health Center following a medical appointment.
The victim’s family has said her husband, Julio Garay, learned of his estranged wife’s whereabouts after someone from the health center mistakenly called Julio Garay to confirm his wife’s clinic appointment.
Julio Garay has pleaded not guilty in connection with the slaying. He faces a jury trial set for Feb. 23, following several recent postponements.
The death sparked a string of separate legal actions, a child custody legal fight, and a call to beef up legal protections for domestic violence victims. It also triggered a $55 million wrongful death claim filed by Calley Jean Garay’s family, who said authorities failed to protect her from her alleged abuser.
In her role as a victims advocate at CAPMC, Rodriguez had been helping Calley Jean Garay through the domestic violence victims process. Following the death, Rodriguez continued assisting the family, including putting them in touch with an attorney who could’ve helped the family through the various legal processes, which included a potential lawsuit against Rodriguez’s employer, CAPMC.
But, according to the victim’s family, shortly after the slaying, Rodriguez told the family her employer was no longer allowing Rodriguez to help them.
Calley Jean Garay’s father, Keith Trout, said that, after his daughter’s death, “they just shut (Rodriguez) down,” and she wasn’t allowed to communicate with his family.
Trout said he hopes Rodriguez wasn’t placed on leave to silence her.
“I hope that they are not doing that,” Trout told The Bee, “trying to keep her from speaking (about) what she knows and about how she feels about the way that they have handled my daughter’s death case.”
Concerns over delays in victim security improvements
Rodriguez had been assisting the family with resource information on what they could do if they chose to file a wrongful death civil case, according to the victim’s family. She had provided information about an attorney who was willing to help pro bono. When she was ordered to stop communicating with the victim’s family, she was also ordered to stop communication with the pro bono attorney, according to Trout, the victim’s father.
Trout eventually hired an attorney from the Bay Area to file the damage claim against Madera County. The claim also names the Camarena Health Center and CAPMC, among other agencies.
In the months following the homicide, Rodriguez locked horns in public with Ryan, the CAPMC attorney. Ryan also works with the Camarena Health Center — the clinic accused of inadvertently exposing Garay to danger — but has denied any conflicts of interest.
Rodriguez first publicly raised concerns about Ryan during a meeting of the Madera County Board of Supervisors in early January. She said Ryan was dragging his feet on a review of security and safety policies and procedures to be detailed in the CAPMC’s victims shelter handbook.
She said security policies remained unchanged in the wake of Calley Jean Garay’s death and that recommended improvements had been gathering dust on Ryan’s desk since mid-September. She urged the county supervisors to put pressure on CAPMC’s attorney to finish the review. She said she’d also brought her concerns to the CAPMC’s Board of Directors but received no response.
Rodriguez returned to the Board of Supervisors a week later, on Jan. 19, and said the situation remained unchanged. She reiterated her criticisms of Ryan and said the security improvements could not wait any longer.
“It’s been four months, and I’ve not heard anything since then,” Rodriguez told the supervisors on Jan. 19. “That’s why I’m here today. It’s for the safety of the population we serve.”
Ryan denied there had been any delay. He said all programs, including victim services, have regular ongoing reviews. That process, he said, was “limited by operational or legal considerations or restraints” in 2020.
Typically, he said, program managers provide suggested revisions on program and policies, which then go to him for a final review. However, he didn’t answer a question about the status of his review on the most recent suggested changes and when those improvements might be implemented.
“Candidly, CAPMC does not understand why Ms. Rodriguez brought the issue of the shelter handbook to the Madera County Board of Supervisors inasmuch as it does not have oversight over the shelter nor does it provide shelter funding,” he wrote in an email to The Bee.
Madera County supervisors have been silent on the issue and have not responded to requests for comment.
Advocate ordered to stop assisting in high-profile case
During the Jan. 19 meeting, Rodriguez also told the supervisors she’d been ordered to stop helping on a case. Rodriguez did not specify which case she’d been told not to work on. She did say it was the first and only time she’d received such an order.
Trout confirmed that Rodriguez told his family privately that she had been ordered to stop helping them after the slaying.
“It’s been shared with me that... it’s out of our scope to assist with civil remedies,” Rodriguez told the supervisors during the Jan. 19 meeting. “A first time hearing that in over 20 years.”
Rodriguez was highly critical of the order. She also said none of her coworkers had been ordered to walk away from any of their cases.
“Just me, and just with this case,” she told the supervisors on Jan. 19. “These are the areas that are gray, and it would be helpful if we had guidance. Is this going to be only Madera of the 58 counties that’s going to change this operation? And if so, provide us that in writing.”
During the same meeting, Rodriguez also blamed the controversial order on Ryan, the attorney she’d criticized previously. She also told the supervisors she was sharing with them a document that she said detailed some of her concerns with Ryan and the order to stop helping with a case.
“It’s never been an issue at the local level with any of the cases that we’ve had. We’ve never been told, ever, not to assist with referring victims that seek civil justice,” Rodriguez said at the meeting. “The only time that’s been brought up, it’s going to be in a record that I’m going to provide to you, in which, a local individual offered it for free, and Russ Ryan did get involved in that and did stop that.”
The exact details of the document remain unclear.
The Bee submitted a Public Records Act request to Madera County for a copy of the record referenced by Rodriguez, but the county denied the request, saying it was attorney-client privileged information.
Ryan also said the document should not have been made public.
Ryan also said victim services files contain “highly confidential and privileged documents and information that are protected from disclosure.” He said domestic violence counselors are not “legally authorized to divulge” that information to the public, the media, or even the victim’s family members, among others.
Ryan said CAPMC’s role in assisting victims is limited. He did not respond to questions about Rodriguez’s claims that such orders had never been given before.
“These activities do not include “seeking civil justice” for victims of crime or their families in the form of being involved or assisting with the possible pursuit of civil litigation such as a civil action for wrongful death,” he wrote in the email to The Bee.
This story was originally published February 9, 2021 at 5:00 AM.
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