Fallen Angels: A Story of California CorruptionAn unconscious young woman in a room full of drugs: that’s the scene at the Hotel Constance in Pasadena, California. But when the hotel manager tries to call 911, the woman’s much older companion tells him that won’t be necessary – he’s a doctor. The manager makes the call anyway. And yet, when the police and paramedics arrive, this so-called doctor simply…walks away. And then the hotel manager learns who this man is: his name is Carmen Puliafito, and he’s the dean of the medical school at the University of Southern California (USC).
There's a kind of inside joke in the hotel industry that the last guest of the day is typically your worst.
That's Devon Khan. He's a reservation supervisor at the hotel Constance in Pasadena, California.
It's always that last person that prevents you from being able to go home on time.
Not me, basically my girlfriend.
There ahead a bunch of breaks. Breathing right now, you're absolutely breathing, and I'm a doctor at is.
You wake out?
No?
Now, I'm pretty sure I'm not going home anytime soon.
Devon Khan has been in the hotel business for most of his career, and working in hospitality has shown him some truth about.
Human nature, not all of it.
Great Gevon knows that once you get pass an upscale hotel's elegant lobby on the other side of that do not disturb sign all kinds of human dramas play out, and people are not always what they see. This is a story that begins in a hotel room in Pasadena and it ends with the undoing of some of the most powerful people in Los Angeles. It's about influence and money and how they can eat away at people and make them look past things they know are very, very wrong. My name is Paul Pringle. I'm an investigative reporter for the La Times. This is Fallen Angels, a story of California corruption, Episode one.
The Hotel Constance.
Pasadena, California is a smaller city wrapped into greater in La Leafy, largely old money, rich and quiet. It's a place you can raise a family even if you're not part of the town's upper class, and Devon Khan is not.
I was living in Pasadena with my wife and my daughter and had gone through a few career ups and downs and kind of bounced around from a few hotels and reinvented myself as a massage therapist and was also doing uber I always found a way to earn money and keep a chicken in the pot, so to speak.
The Hotel Constance opened in the nineteen twenties. It went through some tough times over the years. For a while it was a retirement home, but it's been renovated and now it bills itself as the only luxury, boutine hotel in this part of town.
The clientele that we catered to was kind of really all over the place. Because our rates were relatively low. We really had a mix of people who were affluent and came to the hotel because it was a brand new hotel in old town Pasadena. But we also attracted the late night partiers who found a one hundred and nineteen dollars rate online, and so you never knew who you were going to get.
It's Friday, March fourth, twenty sixteen, and Devon is finishing up his shift. It's been a long day.
The day of the incident, I wasn't in a particularly good mood. I had been passed over for promotion that was pretty much promised to me by the previous general manager. There was no leadership at the hotel. Everyone was across the street at the corporate office. I'd say probably somewhere around three o'clock, the front desk agent called me and asked if I could assist him because there was someone who wanted to speak to a manager. And I went to the desk and tried to get the gist of what the situation was. There was a guest that was supposed to check out but wanted to extend his stay. It was room three oh four. I'd looked to see what the name of the guests was in the room. It did come up as Carmen Puliafido. Once I arrived to the third floor, everything about the situation was not what I expected. Waiting for me at the elevator was a housekeeping supervisor and a security agent. They stopped me before I went to the room and gave me a heads up that inside the room there was an unconscious female whom they were very concerned about that they felt that she needed medical attention.
He knocks on the door of room three zero four.
The guest, a mister Puliafido, opens it, but he keeps the door closed behind it.
He looked like he was in his sixties. He was very disheveled. He just looked like he had had a rough night. I don't know if he was a partying all night or whatnot. The first thing he asks me is if I have his room key, And now I'm confused because I don't know what he's talking about. He made no mention of the girl. He says, they said that you could change my room for me since I can't stay in this room, and I'm like, okay, awesome, that sounds like an easy fix to the situation. I can move him to a new room, and as i'm moving him, I'll have an opportunity to see the young lady in the room and to ascertain if we need to get paramedics involved. As I'm leaving to go get him a room key, I'm stopped again by the security agent. He advises me that the day prior, housekeeping had found what they believed to be methamphetamine in the guest room, and that the manager had said that they were not going to extend his stay. But I'm like, you just told me that there's an unconscious woman in the room and I need to get eyes on her. So if I have to allow him to stay another night and do the room move as a method of getting eyes on the girl, That's what I'm gonna do.
Devon finds the guests another room, so now he has access to room three h four. He gets his key card and opens the door. It's not what he expected.
It's worse. Room three oh four. It's a disaster.
It looks like a crime scene. There's obvious drug activity that has taken place. I'm seeing little nitrous oxide canisters and balloons strewn around the floor. There are scorch marks on the linens from where it was obviously burned, and there was an empty box, but it had the outline of abutane torch.
Devon knows what this means.
Someone's been doing drugs in this room, smoking heroin, cocaine or meth.
Unfortunately, I was very familiar with the paraphernalia that was around the room. I recognized what that box was for because my mother had been addicted to crack cocaine for many, many years.
And then he sees them.
In the wheelchair was this very young lady that was clearly too young to be with this gentleman. She was literally like a rag doll in the chair, all her limbs just completely just dead weight, wearing nothing but one of the hotel robes. But the thing that really made my skin crawl was attached to the television, was like a tripod that would hold like a recording device or cell phone or whatnot. I could look at that situation and see exactly for what it was. I saw every father's worst nightmare, but I had to remain professional. I'm pushing the wheelchair of the young lady down the hallway. I'm speaking to her, ma'am, ma'am, are you okay? It's at that time that I advice mister Puliafedo that it's my intention to call the paramedics.
But despite the woman's condition, this older man, mister Puliofido, is strangely blasse. He says, there's no need for paramedics.
He tried to talk me out of it. He says, well, she's just had too much to drink. I'm going to be keeping an eye on her. I'm a doctor, and I didn't believe that he was a doctor. As far as I could throw him. In my mind, there's no way this guy's a doctor.
Although it goes against all his years following hotel protocol to assure the guests every need is met, to never make a scene, to handle awkward situations with total discretion. Devon ignores Polyiffido and he calls the paramedics himself.
The dispatcher picks up Farmed.
I am calling from the hotel Constence in Pasadena nine two eight East, Colorado. And what room is the pion in three twelve? A male or female female?
How old does she uh?
I'd say maybe mid twenties. She's passed out?
Unresponse, is she breathing? Yes?
Are you able to transfer me to that room or.
Devon transfers the nine to one one call and pull ther Fido.
Answers, hi's a fire department. You say you call for one one, not me.
Basically, my girlfriend here ahead.
A bunch of drinks.
Is she wake now?
No, This is a guy who claims he's a doctor, whose girlfriend, which is what he calls her, is unconscious, whose room looks like a crime scene.
We're going to be there early to check her out.
Okay, okay, fine, fine, fine, thank you.
Do you know how much she drinks a bunch? Did take anythingales with it or just the alcohol?
I think just the.
Alcohol, just the alcohol. That's a lie.
Devon stays on the third floor to make sure the situations under control.
I observed the paramedics bringing the young lady out of the room on a gurney. They were taking her into the service elevator. They were speaking to her the same way, trying to get some response from her. They were calling her by name, and this is the first time that I learned that her name was Sarah, which gave me chills because my daughter's name is Sarah.
While Sarah is being wheeled away, Devon brings the chief paramedic into the room.
The chief came with me. We go into the room and he surveys the room. Our security had opened the safe and inside the safe were the drugs white crystally substance that was in the little plastic ziplock back which appeared to be methamphetamine. He took one look at the room. He's like, lock this room and don't let anyone come in here or touch anything until the police get here.
It will be hard for the police to miss the drugs, but Devon wants to make sure they follow up on what he feels is the most disturbing detail.
The tripod was still on the television. I advised our general manager once he came onto the scene, I said, when the police get here, make sure they get his phone because I'm positive there's some nasty stuff on there.
Now that the general manager has shown up, Devon can finally block out.
I was ready to go at that point, but I was looking forward to coming on Monday to find out what happened. Once the police arrived, I had supreme confidence in the system that this guy would get what was coming to him.
The young woman, Sarah, still unconscious, is taken to hospital. Devon heads down to gather his things. It's business as usual in the lobby, the sirens fading into the distance. You never know anything out of the ordinary had happened upstairs. But any confidence Davon feels in the system, as he calls it, it turns out that's badly misplaced. Three days later, on Monday, March seventh, Devon is anxious to get back to work. He's been wondering all weekend about what happened at the hotel after he left.
I arrived one Monday, and the only other leader that is there when I arrive is the director of finance. He and I were pretty close. We happened to meet in front of the coffee station and and I'm really excited to hear what happened to this guy Once the police arrived. He goes, the police didn't do anything. I'm like, what do you mean, didn't do anything?
Despite a young woman in severe distress, a room littered with illicit drugs, a camera with recordings of whatever had happened in that room. Devon's colleague tells him the guests in three or four had just walked away, and this makes no sense to Devon.
I'm like, the drugs were in the room, they see the drugs, because yeah, they saw the drugs, but they said that drug abuse is not a crime, it's a disease. And when I heard him say that, my blood just boiled because you have to realize, at this time, it seemed like unarmed African American men were being shot weekly by the police. I knew that if I was found in a room with an unconscious white girl and drugs were in the room, the police aren't going to be that compassionate with me. He goes, dev I don't know, it's like the police knew. It's like they knew who he was before they got here.
They knew who he was. What exactly does that mean?
And he says, well, he really is a doctor. And I'm like, there's no way that that guy is a doctor. I'm like, how do you know, he goes because we googled him. He's the dean of medicine for USC.
Doctor Carmen Puliaffido Is It's true, the dean of the University of Southern California's Kech School of Medicine. He's a world renowned ophthalmologist and his salary is one point one million dollars a year.
Doctor Puliafido is exciting, dynamic, brilliant and phenomenal.
So we thank USC for loaning him to us.
Doctor Puliafido, thank you everyone, and welcome to the Kech School of Medicine. Macular degeneration is the leading cause of blindness in the industrialized world.
That's Pulyifido making a presentation at a conference of fellow doctors. Pulyifido co invented a breakthrough technology to treat eye diseases. He founded Harvard's Laser Research Lab, He launched the New England Eye Center, and he had run the University of Miami's I Institute, the number one ophthalmology school in the country according to the US News and World Report. And that makes Bulyiarfido a very valuable guy.
When people around the world think of the intellectual giants of the twenty first century, they will be thinking of the University of Southern California. For the past two centuries we have lived in the age of the Atlantic. As our world today is shifting to a Pacific century. USC is better positioned than anyone else to lead this change.
That's Max Deakias, then the president of the University of Southern California. He's given a commencement speech to a class of bright eyed graduates. Nikias landed in the top job at USC in twenty ten, and he was a man on a mission.
We are betting the future of the university as a research university on the medical and biological sciences. So it's by far one of our very, very top.
Priorities, as he says on the packed red carpet at a fundraising gala. Nikias was determined to make USC one of the top schools in the country, and he had his work cut out for him. For years, US had a reputation as the kind of place rich parents send kids who couldn't get into UCLA. USC didn't have a big endowment like Stanford up the coast, so they were constantly fundraising. Big money is what brings in big name faculty who then get big grants for high end research. That's what gets you up in the rankings at US News and World Report, and that is what Max Takias was determined to do. Some am like Carmen Puliaffido, who'd taken Miami to number one. He was just the kind of talent Nikias needed at the Keech School of medicine. We are committed to training the physician leaders of tomorrow. We are grateful for our many supporters who've made it possible for us to recruit the best and the brightest to our medical school. In the School of Medicine, and that slick US admissions video, Pulliafido is looking sharp in a jacket and tie. A wall of medical journals behind him. Tikias has managed to poach him from the University of Miami. When Puliafido arrived at USC, the school was twenty five spots behind UCLA, it's crosstown rival, But the new Dean of Medicine got right to work.
Pull the Afido lured.
Seventy professors to kick from other institutions, and with those professors came millions of dollars in research funding. By the time pullia Fido got on that nine to one one call at the Hotel Constance, he claimed he brought in over a billion dollars a new funding for the medical school. Devon and his colleagues at the hotel don't know any of this, but that quick Google search makes it clear that this man is a big deal at USC. But impressive credentials and famous names don't typically help in situations like this, where there's an unconscious young woman, drugs.
And a camera.
Devon wants to have faith in the quote unquote system, but days go by, weeks and there's no news of an arrest or any other information on what happened to Sarah.
The young woman.
Was boiling on so many levels. I saw my mom do things that she would never have done before she became addicted to crack, and she was like a completely different person after that. So I knew that there was no way that this young lady would want anything to do with this man, if not for the drugs and the duality of the injustice where this guy could do something so egregious and have no repercussions whatsoever.
He agonizes over what to do, and he doesn't feel the police or the answer.
My trust in the Pasadena Police Department at that time was not very high. They had every opportunity to do the right thing, and they didn't.
Given the unwritten rules of the hotel trade, Devon can't afford to come forward on his own.
My wife was really concerned after the incident about meep getting too involved. She really didn't want me to do anything to jeopardize our livelihood.
Maybe it's the memory of his mother's desperation, or the shamelessness of the man in room three h four, or the fact that the young woman's name is Sarah like his daughter. Devon knows he needs to say something, but he has to find a way to keep his name out of it so he can hopefully keep his job.
So how do you do that?
He submits an anonymous complaint to the Pasadena City Attorney.
Wrote up a little email, and basically told them that there was an incident that took place on March fourth at the hotel constance, that the police arrived but didn't really do anything. I lied and said the press was already aware of the incident and that I wouldn't want to see Pasadena Police Department portrayed in a bad light because they didn't do the right thing. I was pretty satisfied that was an appropriate course of action, but the more I thought about it, I just wasn't convinced that it was enough.
It wasn't.
There's no response to his complaint, no news of a dean at usc wrapped up in a scandal, so he decides to take it to the press. The only times is well known for its hard hitting investigative journalism. It had recently published a major investigation into big Pharma in the OxyContin crisis. Well, when Devin calls The Times, the switchboard at the paper tells him he can leave a message on the tip line.
They say, we have a recording that we send our tips to, and I'm like, no, I don't want to leave a recording because then I'd have to leave my name and number and have someone call me back.
Still doesn't give up, He wonders if it's possible that USC itself is in the dark.
I love USC. I had planned to transfer there to go to the film School, but after I got married, my priority was keeping a chicken in the pot. I had very fond feelings for USC, and this was another reason why I wanted to give them the opportunity to do the right thing, because I knew the impact that this scandal would have on the college.
So he places a call to the office of the President, Max to Kias, but he has to be careful.
I went outside because I clearly didn't want to make the call from the hotel. I walked out on Mentor Avenue, walked about a block or so down the street.
Thank you for calling.
Please remain on the line and we'll be.
Right with you.
And the first person I got, you know, obviously, I told them that I need to speak to the president. She says, yeah, he doesn't take calls, but asking me what it was regarding, and I advised her quickly that your dean of medicine was involved in the incident with an unconscious female that was in his room, and there are also drugs found in the room, and that the press was aware, and that they might want to take action before the story was made public.
When I imagine how this call went, I hear the line go very quiet.
She put me on hold, and someone else came to the phone and I basically explained the same thing to her, and she said that they would need something in writing, and advised hers, I'm not going to put anything in writing because I wanted to remain anonymous. But everything that I'm telling you is verifiable. I said, the police were called to the hotel, addicks were called to the hotel. Now, she just said that she would need me to give her something in writing.
And Devon just can't do that. This is as far as he can go.
At this point. I've done everything that I feel comfortable doing. I was constantly googling Carmen poopet Fido to see if there was anything popping up, like he resigns or he's fired or anything like that, and there was no new information coming up. And he was still on the website as the dean of medicine. So it was at that point and I was like, Okay, well, you know, clearly he's still being protected.
It's been about a month since the incident. At the hotel Constance.
Our neighbor was having a party. The uncle of my neighbor was there, and this the first time I'm meeting him.
The neighbor's uncle is named Ricardo der Antonia.
I've been the La Times since nineteen eighty nine and I've been doing all kinds of photojournalism events and lose.
The month before, Riccardo had been covering the funeral motorcade for Nancy Reagan when he was confronted by three Semi Valley police officers. Someone had reported it he looked suspicious while he was transmitting photos from his car. According to Riccardo, the cops swarmed him, forced him to the ground, and handcuffed.
Him his arm was in a sling and he was talking about how he got ruffed up by LAPD while he was working, and he was very upset about it. And he was like, wait till my work gets a hold of these guys. You know, they're not going to know what hit him. And out of curiosity, I said, well, who do you work for? And he says the La Times. I'm like, oh my god, you know I've been trying to get a hold of someone from the La Times.
He started talking about this incident that you witnessed. It started telling me that there was a cover up the cops, game and fire department and they all kind of just sweeping everything under the rug drugs and officials cover up.
You couldn't believe it.
I laid it out for him and he's like, yeah, that's a story. He's like, I can get the tip to the right person. He goes it, said okay that you know, I give him your contact information. Now it's reluctant, but I said, okay, yes, but let them know that I want to be completely anonymous. I don't want to go on record because I could lose my job and I can't have that. And he said, no problem, and a short time after that, I get a call from Paul.
Again.
My name's Paul Pringle. I'm an investigative reporter for the La Time Times. When I made that call to Devon Khan in April of twenty sixteen, I thought I'd be writing a quick hitch story about a drug overdose. I had no idea it would take me much deeper into the darkest corners of money and influence at two of the most powerful institutions in LA Coming up this season Onfallen Angels.
When people fall in line, they fall in live.
It's a cover up by people that just do not care, didn't matter to them at all.
We were investigating USC, we were investigating Puliathido. Only a month or two after the investigation began, I received some strange visitors at my house.
Hey, how did you find this out?
How did you wink us together?
Do you understand that people are choosing you of sexually assaulting young women for decades?
There were actually several instances that looking back, I realized, Oh, everyone knew.
She was on the balcony and screaming about all the method better means in the grip.
It's hard enough when a member of your family is a drug addict, but add to that unlimited access to money. How do you get them out of that situation. I had to participate in this effort to get this story published otherwise, which is betray my core values.
Why of a journalists in the first place.
We're always going to have predators, but it's the good people who stand by and do nothing that allow them to flourish.
That's coming up this season on Fallen 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 Hannah Leibowitz, Lockhart and Onfajo lock Executive producers are Me, Paul Pringle, Joe Piccarello, and Adam Pinkus for Best Case Studios. Original music is by James Newberry. This episode was edited by Daniel Turek with assistants from Max Michael Miller, additional editings, sound design and additional music by Dean White, Harriet Ryan, Matt Hamilton, Sarah Parvini and Adam Olmaik are consulting producers. Our iHeart team is Ali Perry and Carl Ketel. Follow and rate Fallen Angels wherever you get your podcasts
