Joseph Iniguez, the top aide to Los Angeles County District Attorney George Gascón, agreed this week to drop his federal civil rights lawsuit against the city of Azusa stemming from his 2021 arrest for public intoxication in exchange for a monetary settlement.
Terms of the pending settlement were not disclosed in a notice filed Tuesday, July 11, in U.S. District Court. Iniguez, who is Gascon’s chief of staff, has agreed to dismiss Azusa and police Cpl. R. Martinez as defendants after the settlement is paid, according to the notice.
Iniguez confirmed the settlement agreement Thursday.
“Constitutional policing must be commended, bad policing is a scourge on our community and must be called out,” he said in a statement Wednesday. “While I took this action to hold them accountable, many people with less knowledge of the system have bad experiences with police that impact their trust for some of our most important public servants.
“To support good cops and modern policing strategies, I will be donating the entire settlement amount to the Law Enforcement Action Partnership.”
Iniguez, 37, questioned police and advised his husband not to cooperate with an officer who pulled over his black Tesla just after 11:30 p.m. Dec. 11 in the 900 block East Alosta Avenue, according to an eight-page police report obtained by the Southern California News Group.
Iniguez, who was a passenger in the car, “exited the vehicle and began telling (the driver) that he did not have to answer any questions nor did he have to conduct any field sobriety tests,” says the report submitted by Azusa police Cpl. R. Martinez. “I could see that his (Iniguez) eyes were bloodshot and watery, he had slurred speech, a strong odor of an alcoholic beverage emitting from his breath and person, he admitted to consuming alcoholic beverages and he was not listening to commands from officers.
“He also was pointing out the fact that we (officers) did not have body cameras and told (the…
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