‘We are taking charge’: 7 women sue ex-Windsor mayor, winery and social club over alleged sexual assaults

Thecomplaintcalls Foppoli, 39, “a sexual predator who continuously used his power, connections and alcohol to prey upon dozens of women in Sonoma County.” It seeks unspecified damages.

“今天,我们正在寻求正义the Civil Court as we approach the one year anniversary of the beginning of this investigation,” the women said in a joint statement provided to The Chronicle. “We are united in our voice and stand against Foppoli as well as the entities that enabled him and provided a place for him to continue his predatory behavior which harmed many women beyond us. This is our call for and time for justice.”

The lawsuit comes one year after aChronicle investigationfirst exposed four women’s sexual assault allegations against Foppoli, then a charismatic young mayor whose political star promised to put Windsor on the Wine Country map. Ultimately,13 women came forward with accusationsof sexual assault or sexual misconduct against Foppoli.

The women who brought the lawsuit are not named in the petition and are identified only as Jane Does. However, all seven have previouslyspoken with The Chronicle.

Foppoli, who has previously denied sexually assaulting any women, did not respond to multiple requests for comment. Last spring, Foppolistepped down as mayorand as chief executive of Christopher Creek Winery, identified as the location of four of the alleged assaults.

It was not clear whether Foppoli has maintained an ownership stake in Christopher Creek. Representatives with the winery declined to comment.

In a subsequent investigation,The Chronicle examined Active 20-30,一个社交俱乐部和慈善组织年轻adults with a popular all-male chapter in Santa Rosa. Reporters found that local and national leaders of Active 20-30 had known for years that female members had accused Foppoli of sexual assault and misconduct, but had ignored or joked about the encounters rather than reckoning with them. Foppoli joined the Santa Rosa club around 2007.

Jared Goble, current president of Active 20-30’s Santa Rosa chapter, and Roger Hebert, past president, did not respond to requests for comment. The local clubexpelled Foppoli from the organizationin response to The Chronicle’s original investigation last year.

Ashley Corbett, president of Active 20-30 U.S. and Canada, did not respond to requests for comment. Corbett and her predecessor, Tiffani Montgomery, have previously said in statements to The Chronicle that they couldn’t “change what happened in the past or even how our predecessors’ handled things.” But they said they had, since learning of the allegations against Foppoli, done “EVERYTHING to make sure our members are safe.”

The lawsuit is the first civil complaint to be filed against Foppoli and adds momentum to efforts to hold him accountable. Last month, the Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office sent its yearlongcriminal investigationinto some of the sexual assault allegations against Foppoli to the California Attorney General’s Office, which must decide whether to bring charges.

“Sometimes in civil court, because there is money damages, it is the way to change behavior and change a culture, especially in terms of these businesses and organizations that have enabled Dominic’s behavior for so long,” said Traci Carrillo, an attorney representing the women.

In the 30-page suit, the women assert 12 causes of action, including sexual assault, gender and domestic violence, defamation, and negligence.

They seek both compensatory and punitive damages, and are asking the courts to order “Foppoli and his agents not to release any information, images, photographs, videos, and/or any recordings of Plaintiffs to anyone, and to stay 100 yards away from Plaintiffs and Plaintiffs’ homes and worksites.”

“They were each scared that if they complained about Defendant Foppoli, he would ruin their careers, their businesses, their families and their reputations,” the complaint reads. “Ultimately after survivors started to come forward, he and his agents did everything in their power to try to do just that. ... In some cases, Defendant and his agents were successful.”

When the women came forward in The Chronicle, the lawsuit alleges, Foppoli violated their civil rights by enlisting a longtime associate, Washington lobbyist Robert Stryk, to make dramatic, false claims about the women, while implying he was going to have them secretly recorded to damage their credibility.

The Chronicle reported last spring that Strykmade threats and baseless claimsthat he would provide or publicly release images, emails and videos that would discredit the women who came forward.

具体来说,第七原告宣称Foppoli and Stryk threatened to release a “sex tape” of her.

The women’s allegations span 20 years and include forcible groping and kissing, nonconsensual oral copulation and rape. Six of the women allege that Foppoli used alcohol or other substances to render them “unable to legally consent to or ward off his sexual abuse.” Three of these women said they believe Foppoli drugged them.

Although all the plaintiffs were 18 years old or older when the alleged assaults occurred, four of the women were in their late teens or early twenties. The lawsuit alleges that Foppoli took advantage of their youth and inexperience, in at least two cases convincing the women that “rape was consensual intercourse because they were in a relationship.”

The Chronicle does not generally identify victims of sexual assault. But six of the seven plaintiffs agreed to be named in previous stories. The woman who requested anonymity lives in Windsor and said she was not yet ready to share details of the encounter with her adolescent children.

The woman told The Chronicle that, during a brief relationship in 2003 when she was 18 and Foppoli was 21, he digitally penetrated her without her permission, then raped her twice at a New Year’s Eve party.

Another woman, Shannon McCarthy,said she began dating Foppoli in 2001, when she was 19, and that he sexually assaulted her dozens of times during the three-year relationship. On at least one occasion, she said, he handcuffed her wrists and ankles to a bed and then inserted grapes into her vagina as she cried and begged him to stop.

Sophia Williams accused Foppoli of climbing into bed with her, thrusting his groin against her buttocks and trying to remove her pants while she told him no after a night out with friends in 2006.

Allison Britton said that in 2012, while attending an Active 20-30 convention in Reno, Foppoli engaged her in nonconsensual oral copulation when she was nearly unconscious and too intoxicated to consent. Britton said that she later told leaders in Active 20-30 what had happened, but that theyultimately failed to report her allegationsto the Santa Rosa board or to the organization’s national board.

Sonya McVay said Foppoli ripped off her bikini top, exposing her breasts, and tried to pull her into his lap when they were in a hot tub at Christopher Creek Winery as part of a night out with members of Active 20-30 in 2016.

Rose Fumoso said that, after a party at Christopher Creek, Foppoli drove her to an unknown house, forcibly grabbed her waist, kissed her and groped her buttocks while pinning her body against his own.

Esther Lemus, Windsor’s vice mayor, told law enforcement in April 2021 that she believes Foppoli drugged and raped her after they attended a community event in February 2020.

That August, Lemus reported, she attended an event at Christopher Creek Winery. There, she told law enforcement, she believes Foppoli drugged her before one of Foppoli’s friends engaged her in oral copulation in the winery’s barrel room while she was too intoxicated to consent. This was the incident that led to Robert Stryk’s threats.

The following day, Lemus alleged, Foppoli told her he had a video of the sexual act and that she was “lucky” he had control of the video. Lemus said she feared that Foppoli would retaliate against her if she reported either alleged assault.

More for you

• What you need to know about The Chronicle’s ongoing investigation of former Windsor Mayor Dominic Foppoli
• Timeline of sexual assault allegations against Dominic Foppoli

The lawsuit claims that both Christopher Creek Winery and Active 20-30 had an obligation to warn women about Foppoli. A majority of the alleged assaults, the suit states, occurred during parties at Christopher Creek, where Foppoli was then the chief executive, or in settings associated with Active 20-30 — or both.

The lawsuit contends that both the winery and Active 20-30 “ratified” Foppoli’s behavior by allowing him to continue to work at the winery and to be a member of the children’s charity “despite knowing that Defendant Foppoli was assaulting, abusing and harassing women.”

The Chronicle reported last Aprilthat a woman who belonged to Christopher Creek’s wine club emailed the club manager in 2013, asking to halt her membership because Foppoli had sexually assaulted her fiancee in the winery hot tub. The fiancee — who asked The Chronicle to identify her by her middle name, Jane — said Foppoli put his penis in her hand under the water, leaving her “nauseous, shocked, in disbelief.”

The lawsuit states that Christopher Creek continued to allow Foppoli to lead the business and host events at the winery as both a politician and winery owner, enabling him “to continue preying upon women by providing alcohol and committing additional sexual assaults.”

In aninvestigation published in November, The Chronicle found that national and local Active 20-30 leaders were aware of several allegations of sexual assault and misconduct against Foppoli, including those made by Britton and McVay. Yet reporters found that Active 20-30 leaders chose not to thoroughly investigate the women’s allegations.

The lawsuit claims that both Christopher Creek and Active 20-30 sought to conceal the allegations to “maintain a positive public opinion” and “continue to profit from members, invitees and other funding sources.”

The effects on the women, meanwhile, were severe and ongoing, the complaint states. The women “suffered and continue to suffer injury, including medical bills, significant emotional pain and suffering, mental anguish, humiliation, loss of enjoyment of life, embarrassment, and damage to their reputation.”

“We have patiently waited for some measure of justice from the criminal justice system, which has continued to be delayed, all while we have continued to suffer the emotional toll of Dominic Foppoli’s crimes against us,” the women said in their statement. “He has continued to live his life normally, while we have continued to process what he did to us and others.”

San Francisco Chronicle staff writer Julie Johnson contributed to this report.

Alexandria Bordas (she/they) and Cynthia Dizikes (she/her) are San Francisco Chronicle staff writers. Email:cdizikes@sfchronicle.com,alexandria.bordas@sfchronicle.comTwitter:@crossingbordas,@cdizikes