Episode 2: The Trojan Wall

Every university has a scandal every now and then, we just have the flavor of the week.

That's William Tierney, Professor Emeritus at the University of Southern California. He's been at USC for almost three decades and he's seen the place get caught up in scandal, and not just every now and then.

What is it about USC that has created a non ending bit of scandalmania for the institution?

I've asked myself that same question many times, what is it with USC and its scandals? My colleagues and I have exposed a number of them over the years, and it's not that we go looking for them, they find us. My name is Paul Pringle. I'm an investigative reporter for the La Times. This is Fallen Angels. This story is about power and money and how they can eat away at a place, corrupt it and destroy people lives in

Boy, do I have a tip for you? And he's like, well, I'm just a photographer, but what's the story. So I laid it out for him and he's like, yeah, that's a story. He goes like, I said, I'm a photographer, but I can get the tip to the right person.

Ricardo and the editors bring the tip to me since I have some history investigating USC, so I called Devon Khan.

I get a call from Paul. He says, yeah, I understand that you know you have a tip. Would you mind explaining to me what happened.

Dev On's story is detailed and thorough. He seems like a credible source, but he does have one important condition.

Does the Tip understand that I need to remain anonymous. Can't have this jeopardizing my job at all. He assured me that I would remain anonymous. He says, Okay, I'm going to start looking into this. He goes, I'm definitely going to have to give you a call back from time to time. Is that okay?

I say, sure, whatever you need.

The Times has strict guidelines for granting anonymity to sources. They need to have a compelling reason to go unnamed, like the fact that they would get fired if they were identified. Devon makes that case to me convincingly. But before I could even think about building a story around an anonymous Tip, I have to check out, nail down every detail of Devon's account. This is the starting point of the investigation. First, I checked to see if there has been any recent news about Puliafido.

And yeah.

It turns out that eleven days earlier, he had quote stepped down as dean of the medical school. The press release gives no reason for his sudden resignation, and it's in the middle of the school term, which seems like strange timing. I scrub public records for more on Puliaffido. I find a recent divorce petition filed by his wife. At the same time, I reach out to the coroner's office to see if there's been a death of a young woman in the past few weeks who matches the

Any situation where somebody is seriously injured or likely to die or is dead, those are the cases that would be an automatic complaint report.

Joseph Jackalone had a long career as an NYPD detective with a specialty in forensic investigations. He's one of the experts I contact for law enforcement stories.

If you find lots of paraphernalia at the scene, or guns and drugs or whatever you might find, those will have to have a report because there's nothing on paper. There's nothing to investigate, there's nothing to charge, and that's why documentation becomes its real important and any attorney in the world will tell you that if it wasn't document that it wasn't done.

And the fact that there was a camera potentially filming everything in the room that raises all kinds of questions.

What were they filming? There's lots of evidence that could be found on that video, including the illegal user narcotics, who was using them, and how they were being administered.

But when I asked the police spokesperson about the lack of a report, I'm told the incident had been viewed as a quote, medical emergency, not a crime. I also contact US's executive offices several times, trying to reach USC president Max Tikias to ask him why the dean is a medical school has suddenly stepped down. No response whatsoever, and then I get an email from Pulliafido himself.

Pull Fido right quote.

I understand from my colleagues here at USC that you've been inquiring about my stepping down as dean of the medical school. I wanted to reach out to you directly and let you know that my decision was entirely my own The timing of my decision was related to a unique, time limited opportunity in the biotech industry, something which I am looking forward to sharing with others soon. US was nice enough to grant me a sabbatical to explore this opportunity.

No reply.

I have the same luck with the Kias and the people close to him silence. I'm not surprised, but a lack of response from USC's leaders. Silence had become their typical way of dealing with me. I've investigated USC more than once a colleague, and I discovered that USC's athletic director was paying himself and his family members from a

The coliseum was built to honor World War One veterans.

That's been our Parks. Most people call him Bernie.

It's the only place in the world that's had the kinds of major events, the first Super Bowl, multiple Olympics, a visit of the Pope. It's basically one of the most recognized facilities in the world.

Bernie Parks was chief of the LAPD from nineteen ninety seven to two thousand and two. For the next twelve he served as a member of the La City Council, representing the eighth district in South LA. He's also a USC alum. The coliseum part of his district is very important to him and his constituents.

This house sc football for decades because it's right across the street. It's not a modern football facility as we see on TV, whether it's NFL or other college stadium. Sc it always hinted at they not only wanted to have more upgrades of the facility, they also hinted strongly that if these things couldn't be done, they would like take over the facility.

In twenty eleven, USC launched an aggressive campaign to take control of the coliseum to a master lease that would extend for nearly a century. The decision on whether to accept US's proposal was up to the commission that managed the coliseum parks.

Was on that commission.

They actually sent a proposal to the Colisseum Commission and unanimously the commission rejected it. Members of the Colisim Commission actually laughed at the deal because it was so preposterous. It was like, give us the colissem and let us run it, and community was not even part of the equation. And so a letter was sent with unanimous signatures from every member of the college in commission saying no, thank you, we don't want to participate. This is not a deal

And what s He does is deploy its powerful trustees and other allies to lean on the commission.

The amount of money that they have is significant, the amount of influence they have as far as their graduates and their alumni, the amount of exposure they get from their athletic program. They don't have any problem pushing their weight around as it relates things that they want. They went to Schwarzenegger as the state and they insisted that with his three of appointments, could he make one of them a member of SC's management or their board, and so he agreed to that.

Parks believe that after Governor Schwarzenegger made those appointments to the Coliseum Commission, resistance to a USC takeover started to crumble for some reasons.

When Schwarzenegger got convinced that this was a good deal, all of a sudden, the state begin to send messages quietly that they were in support of this. And so this process continues, and the Coliseum Commission approves this deal and it moves forward. You're basically giving away a facility that was built for military veterans, and you're giving it to a private entity with the ability for them to do with it as they please and keep all the money.

And state.

Bernie says the proach in playbook. Whenever it faces resistance, USC calls on its network of power brokers to neutralize the opposition.

I think what it shows when people fall in line, they fall in line.

It's now June, three months since the overdose at the hotel Constance. Two months into my reporting, I learned from a person within USC that President, Nikias is hosting a celebration for Puliafido in honor of all he has done for the medical school. The reception will be held at the Kech School of Medicine on the Law and outside of building name for Eli and Edith Broade, the La billionaire couple who's thirty million dollar gift paid for it.

Thanks his wife.

I'll have to check the status of that divorce file. This is the first time I've seen Pulliafido in person. I'm struck by his confidence. He appears as if he has nothing to worry about. My investigation included why would the president of USC put on such a public show of appreciation for Puliaffido, especially if he knew that the La Times is investigating him. It might have something to

When I went to SC, a lot of my friends said, Geez, SC is not of the same caliber as Penn State. Why would you be moving to USC. There's an association called the AAU, the Association of American Universities, and that's the elite institutions. At the time, SC was at the bottom of the AAU and trying to move up. Steve Sample came in with a great deal of energy and really wanted to transform the institution.

Steve Sample was president of USC from nineteen ninety one to twenty ten. Tierney saw what he was trying to do, and he believed Sample could pull it off.

For a university to be the best, it's not that we've got a winning football team. It's that you've got a faculty that are the best and you are listening to what they say they need. And that also meant that we needed to bring in enormous amounts of money in a capital campaign.

Ample devoted himself to fundraising NonStop, and when he retired, Max to Kia seemed like the perfect choice to continue that pursuit.

Max was someone who if you called from New York and said, I've got Joe and he's willing to have breakfast with you tomorrow and he might give us big money, but you need to be here for breakfast. Max would take the Red Eye and if he knew that he needed to be back in Los Angeles that night for some type of dinner, he'd do it.

Yikias's drive is understandable when you consider his background as an immigrant who came to this country intent on making something of himself.

Max came from a very poor family in Cyprus. His father was a carpenter. His father said to him at one point, you're a smart, smart boy. I might send you to high school and if you work hard, you can graduate, then become a carpenter. For Max to graduate, go to the United States, to go to a Sunni Buffalo to get his doctorate, comes to USC, rises through the ranks and become a president.

I'm agazing, and his rise brought him into the same room with a lot of rich, powerful, famous people.

When you're having dinner with Steven Spielberg, that's a different sort of undertaking. I do think that created a disconnect between the world of the faculty and the world of la At Max's inauguration, he said, USC, we have to work so hard that we have to run a marathon at a ten k speed. I went up to him afterwards and I said, Max, you can't do that, and you shouldn't tell people to do that, and he said, oh, but we have to.

When he was recruited to USC to run the medical school, Holdieffido understood perfectly that the mandate was to bring in money, and he delivered.

Fundraising in the United States is sort of an odd thing. If you're at Columbia or Harvard, there's a lot of old money and foundations that will give you money. The West, especially Los Angeles, is the opposite of that. It's a lot of new money and you need to be charismatic in a way that maxim Carmen had they knew how to court donors successfully, and they did it.

By the time he quote steps down as dean, Pulldiofido has become the public face of the medical school. If the dean were to get caught up in a scandal, it would be bad for USC. This backslapping ceremony at the Kech School of Medicine might be a face saving gesture for Pulliffido, but maybe it's one for USC as well.

This was a story that had the potential to hold a powerful institution and a powerful person accountable for misconduct.

Matt Lay was my editor at this time. Throughout his career, he's seen his share of corruption and cover up.

I was at the La Times for about twenty eight years. I always tried to focus on investigative reporting, both as a reporter and an editor. I worked with reporters who uncovered corruption at city hall, abuses, in the La County jails. I worked on investigations about dirty doctors, and prior to the USC investigation, I was working on one about Purdue pharmat These are tough.

Stories to do.

They can be controversial, they can have an impact.

On the paper's reputation.

The paper's finances, the paper's legal standing. They are all issues that need to be considered when taking on powerful institutions. But my feeling is that these are good stories.

They should be.

Published with Matt's support. I keep digging. I find Pullio Fido's home address. It's a mansion in Pasadena. Of course, it sits behind a high security gate. No way to knock on his door. I leave my business card with a note on his mail, urging him to get in touch. He doesn't. Finally I get a break. I've made multiple public records requests to opacitying of police, including for the

Wait a minute, what investigation?

How could you have an investigation without a police report? The chief set a trap for himself and walk right into it. Now the city will have to cough up a report.

This story, like a lot of investigative reporting to me is like detective work. You're out knocking on doors and chasing leads and gathering them from me and filing public records requests. There's a couple of different thoughts in journalism, and the one I think Paul was favoring and I was supportive of it was, let's go with what we know, shake the tree and unearth other details that we didn't know.

And finally, shaking that tree actually gets me something. The passing a police department admits they made a mistake. After months of saying there's no police report because there is no need for one because this was a medical emergency, not a crime, the department creates one retroactively three months after the incident. The police spokesperson tells me they dropped the ball because of a quote training issue. I've never

Police departments have policies and procedures and protocols. For a reason, we had a saying and said, went in doubt, fill it out. So if you didn't know you had to fill out a report, just fill it out. The worst thing that could happen is that the supervisor, who has to sign off on it, says, you know what, this isn't necessary, so we're just going.

To get rid of it.

Finally I get access to not just the very tardy police report, but also recordings of the nine one one calls made.

From the hotel.

At first, I'm only given the recording of the call that Devon made.

Are you able to transfer me to that room?

Or?

But it cuts out when the dispatcher asks to be transferred to room three oh four. Then the Pasadena City manager sends me a second recording that he says the city was quote able to obtain, and it's quote a better version of the nine to one one call, and it continues longer than the original file. Good does make me wonder why wouldn't the city release the second recording immediately?

Why hold it back?

I finally get to hear from myself while the second recording is quote better, did.

She wake now?

No, she's sort of very bride.

You know.

Do you know how much she drinks a.

B I mean I came in the room and.

There were lots of didn't you take any deals with it?

Or just the alcohol?

I think just the alpha the call places pull your feto at the scene. We know from the report there's meth in the room, and here he is present at the overdose of a young woman, and you can hear that he lies. He doesn't mention the drugs that, according to Devon and the police report were found in a room. So far, everything Devon con has told me has checked out. I have plenty to run my story. My editor, Matt Laatee, agrees.

The first draft was well documented, based on police reports, nine to one one recordings, interviews with key people. It was a solid story.

There might be more to report in follow up stories, but the details we have are bulletproof.

The hot shot, Din.

Of USC's medical school has caught up in an incident where a young woman has overdosed on drugs and he lies to the police.

Then he mysteriously steps down. It looks bad and it's essence.

This is the story about a powerful man abusing his position and authority, and then on top of that you have an institution that is essentially covering up before this man.

It's Friday, the end of the day. I'm on my way out the door. I stop and talk to my friend Jack Leonard.

I've been at the Los Angeles Times for more than twenty five years. I started as an intern there in nineteen eighty seven, and I've covered many different beats, police, crime, county government. I've done a lot of investigative work. Paul is excited about every really good story.

That he works on.

When he finds some wrongdoing, when he finds something that authorities or powerful people are trying to keep him, he gets very excited about it. And that's contagious, and he likes sharing that.

Like many of us do.

So he comes over to my desk and he starts telling me about the story.

I tell him about Puliafido and USC, the stone walling from the cops, the retroactive police report.

I remember him talking about Pasadena police and how they were not providing him with the requids that they were supposed to be providing.

But Jack's reaction is not what I expect.

I said something to the defects of what makes you think they could have publish that?

And that's when I start to think, how far does USC's influence actually go? Is it possible that it could extend all the way into my own newsroom? Next time on Fallen Angels as.

An investigative reporter. Every story could be your lost.

Matt and I face an uphill battle trying to get our Pullia Fido story in the paper.

I was in this defiant mode and kind of clung to the idea that Dagon City wasn't closing the door to more reporting.

So we decide to force the issue.

I remember being in the conference room and Matt had said, like, look, we're going to do this thing.

We're just going to keep it on the downlow. We're going to make it so they have to publish Paul story. That's next time. On Angels.

Fallen Angels, The Story of California Corruption is a production of iHeart Podcasts in partnership with Best Case Studios. I'm Paul Pringle. This show is based on my book Bad City, Peril and Power in the City of Angels. Fallen Angels was written by Isabel Evans, Adam Pinks, and Brent Katz. Isabel Evans is our producer, Brent Katz is co producer. Associate producers are Hanna Leebowitz, Lockhart and On Pajo Locke. Executive producers are Me, Paul Pringle, Joe Picarello, and Adam Pinkus.