A top aide to Mayor Eric Adams sabotaged the career of an NYPD sergeant who rejected his sexual advances — and was so well known for his pervy proclivities that a department chief refused to leave him alone with any woman on his team, according to a new lawsuit. Former cop Roxanne Ludemann’s suit accuses Adams senior advisor Timothy Pearson of engaging in a stomach-turning pattern of
Sexual Harassment that included allegedly cornering her in a copy room during a December 2022 office party so he could rub her shoulders. “[He] would regularly harass [Ludemann] when he saw her … and wanted to make plaintiff his driver in order to gain private access to her to continue to sexually harass [her],” the civil complaint, filed Thursday, states. The suit claimed Pearson’s alleged abuses led to Ludemann being passed over for promotion several times — and eventually, to bogus disciplinary charges brought in retaliation for her complaints, the Manhattan
Supreme Court suit said. This, along with a dearth of overtime pay — which allegedly dried up after she came forward with her accusations — eventually forced the veteran
police sergeant of 18 years out of the department in January 2024. “Plaintiff did not want to retire from the NYPD at that time but was forced to retire as the abuse, lack of promotional opportunities, harassment, lack of overtime, disparate treatment and retaliation became so severe that [she] felt compelled to retire,” John Scola, her attorney, wrote in the suit. “If Plaintiff acquiesced to the sexual advances of Defendant Pearson, she would have been promoted.” The NYPD declined to comment on the litigation Thursday, saying instead the department “does not tolerate discrimination or sexual harassment in any form and is committed to respectful work environments for our diverse workforce.” Scola charged that both the department and City Hall “have known about the sexual harassment by Tim Pearson for more than a year, and have refused to remove him from office.” “During that time, Pearson used his power within the NYPD to ruin the career of a distinguished sergeant who refused to acquiesce to his sexual advances,” he told The Post. A City Hall spokesperson said: “We will review the lawsuit and respond in court.” Ludemann claimed in the suit that she lost more than $2 million worth of income because of the discriminatory and retaliatory actions. She wants a judge to grant her compensatory, emotional distress and punitive damages against the defendants, which include Pearson, the city, its Economic Development Corporation (EDC) and NYPD Chief of Department Jeffrey Maddrey. As a senior advisor to the mayor who also works for the EDC, Pearson regularly sat in on meetings of the Mayor’s Office of Municipal Services Assessment, which was then a new unit that sought to make local agencies more efficient, the lawsuit said. In the summer of 2022, Marmara chose Ludemann to be the unit’s chief of staff — meaning she regularly ran into Pearson, a retired NYPD inspector who always hung out in the 13-person office at 375 Pearl Street in Manhattan. That’s also where he earned a slimy reputation for asking
Women “uncomfortable, sexually-driven questions” that made them squirm, the lawsuit said. He’d put his hands on the women’s arms or backs as they spoke, rubbing them and giving off “creepy” and “sexual” vibes, the suit alleges. “This touching was never welcoming and [was] sexual in nature,” the lawsuit said, adding Ludemann “felt powerless” given Pearson’s high-up position. He would also allegedly “lick his lips when he is talking and open his legs when speaking to women in an overtly sexual way.” And he’d ask Ludemann probing, inappropriate questions, the suit said — asking if she was married and happy in a relationship. Things allegedly got worse when Pearson took direct control of Ludemann’s unit in October 2022. “The repeated comments, sexual gestures and touching worsened,” Scola, the attorney, wrote in the suit. Eventually, Ludemann came to believe she’d have to have sex with Pearson to secure a long sought-after promotion to sergeant special assignment, which came with a hefty pay bump, according to the complaint. But she told him that she wasn’t interested in driving him around, working with him or having sex, the suit said. On Dec. 1, 2022, Pearson allegedly cornered Ludemann at an office party by cajoling her into a copy room under the guise of discussing “design plans for a project,” the suit said. That’s when he began to rub her shoulders and arms, “as he typically does with impunity,” it charged. Pearson’s alleged unwanted touching of Lidermann was interrupted by her boss, Chief Miltiadis Marmara, who later got into a months-long battle with Pearson over his questionable conduct, according to the suit. Marmara wanted to report his boss for sexual harassment, but Ludemann allegedly begged him not too — as filing a complaint would be “career suicide” for her, she said. Instead, Marmara held a meeting with Ludemann and several others to discuss Pearson, who had allegedly crossed a line and sexually harassed several women on the team, the suit said. Marmara reluctantly agreed not to file a formal complaint. But he said that from then on, Pearson wasn’t allowed to be alone with “any woman on the team or else they would be at risk,” according to lawsuit. “Specifically, Chief Marmara orders that if he is ever on vacation or out of the office, if Pearson is in the office, either of the two men at the meeting … must follow him at all times to ensure he is not alone with a woman team member,” the suit said. Then the retaliation allegedly started. Pearson torpedoed several promotions for Ludemann over the next few months, and eventually got into an argument with Marmara about his meddling in her affairs, the suit claimed. Marmara eventually quit the office, leaving on April 11, 2023, to go back to his NYPD duties after a screaming match with Pearson, according to the complaint. Ludemann eventually left the office as well, moving back to patrol in a de facto demotion that “ended [her] career with the NYPD — and any chance that she would ever be promoted to sergeant special assignment,” the filing states. The department’s internal affairs division began investigating her shortly thereafter, and allegedly confiscated her cell phone and locked her out of the NYPD system for several weeks, according to the suit. In August 2023, the department charged her with behavior unbecoming to a supervisor and failure to follow instructions, the suit said. By December, she filed for retirement. On Jan. 31, she left the NYPD. “[Ludemann] did not want to retire and would have worked as long as she could have if she was not forced to retire as a result of the sexual harassment, discrimination and retaliation,” Scola wrote. “[She] was constructively discharged from her employment with the NYPD.”