Long Beach : Civil Service Panel Refuses to Reinstate Police Sergeant

A fired Long Beach police sergeant who was acquitted of rape and attempted rape will not be allowed to rejoin the department, his attorney said this week.

Former Sgt. Robert Ballew, a 16-year veteran of the department, sought to regain his job after a jury acquitted him in August of raping a woman in 1985 and assaulting another last year.

But the Long Beach Civil Service Commission voted last week to deny Ballew’s request to be reinstated, said his attorney Jim Trott.

The department fired Ballew after he was arrested on charges of attempted rape Sept. 15, 1991. Shortly after that arrest, Ballew also was charged with raping another woman in 1985.

On Aug. 13, a jury acquitted him of most of the sex crime charges. Jurors deadlocked on whether he kidnaped a woman with the intent to commit rape.

After filing an appeal for his job with the Long Beach Civil Service Commission, Ballew underwent an administrative hearing resembling a courtroom trial. The seven-week hearing was at times emotional, Trott said, as the woman who accused Ballew of attempted rape stormed out of the room during her testimony. “She was angry because she felt badgered,” Trott said.

The woman testified that Ballew offered her a ride, but instead, took her to a secluded area of San Pedro and attacked her. In the 1985 case, the other woman accused Ballew of assaulting her in a secluded area after offering to give her a ride to the Long Beach Naval Station, where she was based at the time.