IV. Adverse Personnel Actions (2025–2026)

IV. Adverse Personnel Actions (2025–2026)

The Adverse Personnel Actions catalogued below were not administrative errors. They were acts taken by sworn California peace officers and UC administrators functioning as state actors under color of authority — within the meaning of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and 18 U.S.C. § 242 — whose collective conduct has deprived the Complainant of constitutionally protected property interests without notice or hearing, in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process Clause. A protected property interest exists where an independent source — a statute, rule, contract, plan document, or mutual understanding — creates a legitimate claim of entitlement (Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564 (1972)). The constitutional adequacy of the process due is measured by the three-factor test of Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U.S. 319 (1976) — the private interest at stake, the risk of erroneous deprivation and the probable value of additional procedural safeguards, and the government’s interest. As applied to benefits termination, Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U.S. 254 (1970), and to public-employment property interests, Cleveland Board of Education v. Loudermill, 470 U.S. 532 (1985), supply the analytical anchors. Institutional liability is governed by Monell v. Department of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658 (1978). The state actors whose conduct is catalogued below include: Captain Jeff Chobanian (Badge #307); Lieutenant James Echols; Lieutenant Richard L. Davis; Chief Craig Valenzuela; Beverly Jeanine Williams-Cook, Benefits Analyst III; and Erin Morse, Benefits/Insurance Supervisor — each acting within the scope of institutional authority, each on a documented written record, each on dates that place their actions in direct temporal proximity to the Complainant’s Protected Disclosures.

The central instrument of that deprivation is the Complainant’s sworn peace officer personnel file — a record protected under California Penal Code § 832.7 and the Pitchess discovery framework; required to be maintained under Government Code § 3306.5(b) and California Code of Regulations Title 8 § 15400.2; subject to the Complainant’s right of inspection and response under POBR Government Code §§ 3305 and 3306; and independently required to be preserved without destruction under California Code of Regulations Title 8 § 10102, which mandates that workers’ compensation claim files where future benefits may be payable “shall not be destroyed” — a requirement that applies here because Workers’ Compensation Claim No. 199650445, settled March 2003 with lifetime paid health insurance and continuing disability income, has never been formally closed, the WCAB has never issued a modification order, and future benefits remain payable under the terms of that settlement and the Octagon Risk Services permanent and stationary determination of August 8, 2001. The Complainant’s personnel file contains the workers’ compensation records, medical releases, and disability classification records required to establish the continuing benefit obligations UC now disputes. Under Title 8 § 10102, that file cannot legally be destroyed. Under Title 8 § 15400.2, it shall not be destroyed. Under the litigation hold of February 9, 2026 (EX 20), it was expressly forbidden from destruction by written legal notice. Three independent legal authorities prohibit its destruction. It may not exist.

That file contains the documentary basis for the Complainant’s true employment classification. Captain Chobanian cited it as the source of the “medically separated on March 1, 1996” determination that denied the Complainant’s CCW and anchored UC RASC’s subsequent coverage termination. Captain Chobanian confirmed in writing that he reviewed the file on August 25, 2023 and again on February 10, 2026 — one day after the Complainant served a written litigation hold on him expressly forbidding its destruction. Fifty-one days after that litigation hold, Lieutenant Echols stated in writing that the agency had received the wrong box and that the Complainant’s files, “if they still exist,” are difficult to locate. The four mutually irreconcilable custody-of-file statements issued between February 24, 2026 and April 1, 2026 — on UCLA PD letterhead, with Captain Chobanian CC’d on each — cannot all be true on the same set of facts. At least one is false. Sworn California peace officers who issue written statements they know to be false regarding a protected personnel file subject to a documented legal hold trigger California Penal Code § 118.1 (false reports by peace officers), § 135 (destruction or concealment of documents subject to legal process), and § 135.5 (concealment of evidence in a public investigation — the Labor Code § 132a crime report of February 19, 2026 and the POSAD complaints PUBLIC-26-000212/213/214 are public investigations within the meaning of § 135.5).

The following Adverse Personnel Actions are presented in chronological order. Each identifies the responsible state actor, the date, the management action, and the chapter and exhibit in the Bruin Watch evidentiary record where the action is documented. No new exhibits are introduced; every link points to a record already published in the Bruin Watch series.

A — January 2026: Silent Removal of $727.48 Premium Deduction

UC SILENTLY REMOVES THE $727.48/MONTH PREMIUM DEDUCTION FROM THE COMPLAINANT’S PENSION

During the month of January 2026, the University of California internally processed the removal of the $727.48 monthly premium deduction for UC High Option Supplement to Medicare PPO coverage from the Complainant’s UC Retirement Annuity pension calculation. No notice of any kind was provided. No letter was sent. No UCRAYS portal message was posted. No telephone call was made. The Complainant did not request the change, did not authorize the change, was not informed of the change, and had no mechanism by which to discover the change other than by examining his bank deposit on the first of the following month. Since the 2015 conversion, the pension deduction had been the sole mechanism by which the Complainant’s premium reached Anthem; the Complainant had never had the ability to pay Anthem directly. UC’s unilateral removal of the deduction created a manufactured non-payment default that UC and Anthem subsequently used as the asserted basis for the April 1, 2026 termination of coverage. The premium-deduction removal is a unilateral modification of an established personnel/payroll arrangement, executed without notice, without consent, and without any predicate event in the Complainant’s conduct — and is independently an Adverse Personnel Action within the meaning of Policy 1100563 § B that materially and negatively affected the Complainant’s existing terms and conditions of employment-derived benefits.

B — February 11, 2026: Williams-Cook Concealment-by-Fiduciary Call

BENEFITS ANALYST III BEVERLY JEANINE WILLIAMS-COOK PERSONALLY CALLED THE COMPLAINANT AND CONCEALED MATERIAL FACTS BEARING ON IMMINENT LOSS OF MEDICAL COVERAGE

At 3:07 PM Pacific on February 11, 2026, Beverly Jeanine Williams-Cook, Benefits Analyst III, UC RASC, telephoned the Complainant in her official capacity. During that call Williams-Cook did not disclose that UC had already removed the $727.48 monthly premium deduction from the Complainant’s pension; did not disclose that Anthem Blue Cross was no longer receiving the Complainant’s monthly premium; did not disclose that the Complainant’s UC High Option Supplement to Medicare coverage was at risk of cancellation for non-payment; did not disclose any of the four mutually inconsistent termination dates that would subsequently appear in the record (April 1, April 30, May 1, and the unwritten internal-system date). Each of these facts was within Williams-Cook’s actual or constructive knowledge as the assigned Benefits Analyst III on the Complainant’s account. Each was material to the Complainant’s ability to take protective action. The Complainant was at the time recovering from cancer surgery scheduled for February 25, 2026, was undergoing cardiac treatment and neurological care, and was substantially dependent on continuous medical coverage. Concealment of material facts by a UC fiduciary acting in her official capacity, on a UC-initiated call, fourteen days before the Complainant’s cancer surgery, constitutes an Adverse Personnel Action distinct from and additional to the February 27, 2026 Administrative Review Determination Williams-Cook subsequently issued.

C — March 28-29, 2026: Williams-Cook Letter Mailed Late with Defective Phone Number

MARCH 28-29, 2026 — WILLIAMS-COOK ADMINISTRATIVE REVIEW DETERMINATION ARRIVES THIRTY DAYS AFTER ITS PRINTED DATE WITH A DEFECTIVE CONTACT TELEPHONE NUMBER

The Williams-Cook Administrative Review Determination is dated February 27, 2026. The Complainant did not receive the determination until on or about March 28-29, 2026 — approximately thirty days after its printed date. The Complainant has retained the envelope. The determination contains a contact telephone number that is incomplete: “800-888-826” — missing the final digit of the actual number, 800-888-8267. The determination requested no documents from the Complainant; addressed none of the Complainant’s six prior RASC filings; and directed the Complainant exclusively to Via Benefits without disclosing the Complainant’s federal Medigap guaranteed-issue rights under 42 U.S.C. § 1395ss(q)(2)-(3). The thirty-day mailing delay materially compressed the Complainant’s window to respond to a determination that itself stated the Complainant’s coverage would be suspended on April 30, 2026 — leaving the Complainant approximately thirty days, rather than the sixty days reflected in the printed date, to perfect any response. The defective contact telephone number — printed on a written determination issued by a UC Benefits Analyst III on UC institutional letterhead — independently impeded the Complainant’s ability to contact UC RASC by the channel UC itself designated for that purpose. The combination of late mailing, defective contact information, omission of any document request, omission of disclosure of federal guaranteed-issue rights, and direction to a Via Benefits pathway for which the Complainant had already been declared ineligible by UC’s own contracted administrator constitutes an Adverse Personnel Action under Policy 1100563 § B.

D — April 30, 2026 to May 1, 2026

The University of California has, as of April 30, 2026, removed my medical coverage and as of May 1 shorted my pension income — income of a documented permanently disabled peace officer, a documented 32-year whistleblower, a cancer patient, and a cardiac patient — simultaneously, without prior written notice, without a hearing, and without lawful authority under 42 U.S.C. § 1395ss(q)(1), California Labor Code § 5804, or UC Gold Book GO 21-02 § 1700.1(b)(1).

UC stopped deducting my premium in January 2026 without notice. UC then used the resulting non-payment — which UC itself manufactured — as a contributing basis for the termination of my coverage. UC then reinstated my coverage after regulatory intervention. UC then entered a phantom pay stub dated April 1, 2026 showing negative $727.48 — the exact amount of the premium UC had stopped collecting — with no gross income, no deductions, and no explanation. UC then applied that entry against my May 1, 2026 pension payment. I did not fail to pay my premium. I had no mechanism to pay it other than the deduction UC controlled and UC unilaterally stopped.