A former Brooklyn prosecutor is facing even more lawsuits for using her office to illegally wiretap conversations between a reputed love interest and a fellow prosecutor.
Tara Lenich has already been sued by her onetime colleague Stephanie Rosenfeld, but now her alleged obsession Jarrett Lemieux has filed his own lawsuit against her — as have her victims’ family and friends who say they were unwittingly surveilled as well.
The lawsuits, filed Monday in Brooklyn federal court, name not just Lenich but also the City of New York and the higher-ups at the Brooklyn DA’s office, including Brooklyn DA Eric Gonzalez and even the widow of late Brooklyn DA Ken Thompson as the administrator of his estate.
“We’re going to defend ourselves, and that will come out as the case goes on,” Lenich’s civil attorney Eric Creizman said.
A former supervisor in the Brooklyn DA’s Violent Criminal Enterprises Bureau, Lenich was sentenced to a year and a day behind bars earlier this year for ordering wiretaps and forging search warrants to spy on her former lover and colleague.
“This illegal wiretapping operation caused serious harm to Ms. Rosenfeld and Det. Lemieux, who have each filed federal lawsuits seeking to recover for their substantial injuries,” reads the class action, headed by Rosenfeld’s sister Danielle Rosenfeld and Lemieux’s uncle, Vincent Garcia.
“But they are not its only victim,” the papers say. “Not one of the hundreds of individuals who spoke to, or exchanged text messages with, Ms. Rosenfeld or Det. Lemieux during the time their cellular phones were illegally tapped consented to their conversations being intercepted or recorded. Each of these individuals is the victim of a serious invasion of privacy carried out by a high-ranking New York City official, acting in the course of her employment, on City time, using City equipment and facilities, and financed by City funds.”
The class action claims there are at least 700 individuals who were unknowingly monitored. The lawsuit seeks unspecified damages.
The Brooklyn DA’s Office referred an inquiry to the city law department, where a spokeswoman said: “We’ll review the complaints and respond accordingly.”
A lawyer for Lushawn Thompson did not return a request for comment.
