Press Room

The charges announced July 13, 2026 confirm what the women in custody said from the beginning. On July 12, 2025, while on duty at County Jail No. 2, Deputy Musto allegedly asked a female inmate whether she had surgically augmented her body and then, without permission or lawful necessity, reached out and touched the inmate’s breast. The incident was captured on jail surveillance footage and left the woman humiliated and embarrassed, according to the District Attorney. Musto is charged with battery (Penal Code section 242) and one misdemeanor count of assault by a public officer (Penal Code section 149). The District Attorney’s office said the matter remains an active investigation.

The criminal case arrives one year after the conduct, and only after the women filed suit. Their federal complaint, filed May 22, 2026, alleges a coordinated, supervisor-authorized pattern of suspicionless and degrading searches of women at County Jail No. 2, including a filmed mass strip search, cross-gender observation in violation of the Sheriff’s own policy, denial of menstrual hygiene, and retaliation against women who complained.

Deputy Musto is scheduled to be arraigned July 14, 2026 at 9:00 a.m. in Department 17 at the Hall of Justice, 850 Bryant Street, San Francisco (Court Number 26016092). Counsel for the plaintiffs are available for on-camera and phone interviews before and after the arraignment. The plaintiff who reported this incident is available for comment from custody, arranged through counsel; to request an interview, contact [email protected] or (510) 560-6731.

The civil case is Sahagun Lopez, et al. v. City and County of San Francisco, et al., in the U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, San Francisco Division. The criminal matter is People v. Nanette Musto: battery (PC 242) and assault by a public officer (PC 149), Court Number 26016092. Counsel of record are Elizabeth Bertolino of Bertolino Law, PC, and Anthony L. Label and Molly Ryan of The Veen Firm, LLP.

The complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, San Francisco Division, brings claims on behalf of twenty named plaintiffs and a proposed class of women searched at County Jail No. 2. It alleges the searches were conducted without individualized suspicion, were observed and recorded in violation of the Sheriff’s Office’s own cross-gender policy, and were followed by retaliation against women who reported them.

According to plaintiffs’ counsel, the searches were not the isolated act of a single deputy but a pattern authorized and overseen at the supervisory level. The complaint further alleges that women in custody were denied menstrual hygiene products and subjected to conditions that compounded the humiliation of the searches themselves.

The case is Sahagun Lopez, et al. v. City and County of San Francisco, et al., in the U.S. District Court, Northern District of California, San Francisco Division. Counsel of record are Anthony L. Label and Molly Ryan of The Veen Firm, LLP, with co-counsel Elizabeth Bertolino of Bertolino Law, PC. Counsel are available for interviews; to arrange one, contact [email protected] or (510) 560-6731.

The student, identified in court filings only as John Doe to protect his identity as a minor, has developmental and communication disabilities and is enrolled in the special education program at Dos Pueblos. The complaint alleges he was repeatedly abused by three former paraeducators while being assisted with toileting and hygiene in restrooms and other secluded areas of the campus, places his caregivers were trusted to be alone with him.

The named defendants are former Dos Pueblos special education employees Andrew Grimes, Andrew Mitchell, and Miguel “Michael” Angel Juarez. On May 8, 2025, the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office arrested Juarez in a separate matter involving an adult victim and issued a public call for additional survivors and witnesses.

One day after Juarez was arrested, Sheriff’s detectives arrested Shaun Donald Hertlein, then a walk-on assistant football coach at Dos Pueblos and a youth pastor in Goleta. Hertlein pleaded guilty in October 2025 to felony possession of more than six hundred images of child sexual abuse material. He is not a defendant in the Doe matter.

Counsel of record are Steven A. Kronenberg, Anthony L. Label, and Bryan Ceglio. The Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office continues to seek additional survivors related to the May 2025 arrest of defendant Juarez at (805) 681-4171. Confidential support is available 24 hours a day from Standing Together to End Sexual Assault at (805) 564-3696, in English and Spanish. Families who believe a relative may have been harmed at Dos Pueblos may contact The Veen Firm, or learn more at veenfirm.com/sexual-assault.

In the early morning hours before Thanksgiving 2024, a Cybertruck carrying four students slammed into a tree on a residential street in Piedmont and caught fire. A friend driving behind jumped out and ran to the truck. He reached for the doors. There were no handles. He pressed the electronic buttons. Nothing happened. He grabbed a tree branch and swung it at the window again and again, but the reinforced glass held. When it finally broke, he reached in and pulled Miller, 20, to safety.

He could not reach the other three. Soren Dixon, 19, Jack Nelson, 20, and Krysta Tsukahara, 19, died trapped inside. All four were 2023 Piedmont High School graduates home for Thanksgiving.

The Cybertruck has no exterior mechanical door handles. It relies on electronic buttons powered by the vehicle’s low-voltage electrical system. The complaint alleges those buttons failed after the collision on Hampton Road at about 3:07 a.m. on November 27, 2024.

The complaint alleges Tesla has known about the risk of trapping occupants for over a decade, citing incidents across multiple models including a fatal Cybertruck fire in Baytown, Texas in August 2024.

Miller suffered catastrophic injuries including a five-day induced coma, burns to his airways and lungs, major abdominal surgery, four fractured vertebrae requiring spinal fusion, third-degree burns to his left leg and left hand, and significant burn debridement surgery. The case is Miller v. Tesla, Inc., Case No. 25CV135984, Alameda County Superior Court. Separate lawsuits have been filed by the families of Tsukahara and Nelson. Wu and Label are available for interviews.

Ty Whitehead was severely injured in March 2017 when his bike hit a large pothole on Skyline Boulevard in Oakland during a training ride for the AIDS/LifeCycle charity event. He was thrown over the handlebars and suffered a traumatic brain injury, remaining in a coma for about two weeks. The trial court, and later the Court of Appeal, initially dismissed his case, pointing to a liability release Whitehead had signed before the ride, even though Oakland was not a party to that agreement.

The California Supreme Court rejected the city’s attempt to use the waiver as a shield, determining that a private release cannot absolve a public entity of its duty to maintain safe public roadways.

The outcome has broad implications for communities statewide, setting a strong precedent that cities and counties cannot contract away their responsibility for safe infrastructure. Bicycle and pedestrian advocates, several of whom filed supporting amicus briefs, had warned that allowing cities to evade liability would endanger the public.

The case is Whitehead v. City of Oakland, California Supreme Court Case No. S284303.