Federal jury slaps $100,000 fine on Gus Kramer

At 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, an eight-member Federal Court jury returned with a fine for County Assessor Gus Kramer, who had been found guilty earlier this week of retaliating against a staffer who had filed a sexual and racial harrassment suit. 

The jury ordered Kramer to personally pay $100,000 in punitive damages, and directed Contra Costa County to pay the plaintiff $275,000 in compensatory reparations for emotional distress. It also ordered the county to pay $34,000 in lost wages, according to Pamela Price. Price is a respected Bay Area attorney specializing in civil rights cases who represented the plaintiff, Bernice Peoples, a staff appraiser in the Assessor’s office who had worked in an entry-level position for the past two decades without promotion.

Peoples filed a lawsuit against Kramer in January of 2007 after he had reportedly handed her a motel key prior to a meeting discussing a potential job promotion for Peoples.

“We had a great jury who was committed to staying until they got the job done,” said Price via cell phone as a cacophonous crowd was heard celebrating in the background.

“We are thrilled,” she added.

As reported in the Dec. 2 issue of the Gazette, Kramer paid a $5,000 fine to the Bay Area Air Quality Management District for illicitly demolishing a home he owned in Bay Point in early 2006.

Kramer, whose job it is to “discover and assess all property within the county and audit all entities doing business in the county,” according the County Assessor’s Web site, was himself audited by the District for not complying with rules regarding the demolition of buildings suspected of containing asbestos.

He paid the fine in early 2008.

Kramer was not available to comment on this story.

For the full story on the Peoples v. Contra Costa, Kramer & Koch verdict, see the Sunday edition of the Gazette.