Judge Dismisses Suit Against Nathan Fletcher

This post first appeared in the Morning Report. This post has been updated.

San Diego Superior Court Judge Matthew Braner has ruled that, because of Grecia Figueroa’s rampant and willful “spoliation” of evidence, he will dismiss her sexual harassment case against former County Supervisor Nathan Fletcher.

Read the tentative ruling published on Thursday here.

“As set forth above, Plaintiff engaged in a pattern of preserving only the evidence she believed was helpful to her case, while actively deleting, or knowingly allowing to be deleted, evidence that was likely detrimental to her claims,” Braner wrote in the tentative ruling.

If it is upheld, it will end the legal case against Fletcher that itself ended his high-profile political career and sent county politics and governance into turmoil for two years. Fletcher admitted to an inappropriate relationship with Figueroa but her claims that he assaulted her have steadfastly withered away amid a series of contradictions and lack of evidence. Last week, her case against the Metropolitan Transit System claiming her firing was unjustified was also dismissed.

Figueroa lost or changed attorneys several times. Fletcher still has a defamation case ongoing against Figueroa.

Figueroa told the Union-Tribune on Thursday that she was stunned by the judge’s decision. On Friday morning, she told the court that she found it disrespectful to invalidate her experience and to call “abuse of power an affair.”

“At this point I have complied with discovery, I have sat for more than 25 hours of deposition, produced ten thousand messages between my friend and I have turned over medical records and personal records, and nothing was deleted with the intent to hide anything,” Figueroa said. “In fact I wish I had some of the missing evidence because I think it could be helpful to my case.”

Figueroa told Fox 5 that she plans to appeal the decision.

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