The office of the Utah Attorney General at the Capitol in Salt Lake City is pictured on Tuesday, Jan. 16, 2024. (Photo by Spenser Heaps for Utah News Dispatch)
A legal secretary for the Utah Attorney General’s Office lost her job after a viral video showed she had tugged down a young woman’s skirt that she felt was too revealing, touting her position as a state employee as she did so.
According to a termination letter sent to Ida Lorenzo on April 25, obtained through a records request, Lorenzo was informed she had “not passed your probationary employment period successfully.” The brief letter cited “your non-compliance with policies and standards related to performance.”
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She was charged that same day with sexual battery, a class A misdemeanor. The charge carries a potential sentence of up to a year in jail and up to a $2,500 fine.
Lorenzo had been hired March 4 as a legal secretary, according to KSL.com.
In the video taken April 20 in the lobby of a busy St. George restaurant, which has more than a million views on TikTok and has been shared thousands of times, Lorenzo holds up an employee badge and tells a young woman and her friends “I happen to work for the state, and if I have to see your a** cheeks hanging out again, I will call CPS,” a reference to Utah’s Child Protective Services office.
Saying she’s a state employee, woman tugs down another’s skirt at restaurant; charges filed
According to a caption on the video by the person who recorded it, Lorenzo became “upset my friend is wearing a mini skirt, so she aggressively yanks it down and says ‘you’re probably underage, you probably shouldn’t be wearing that’ then causes a scene in a busy restaurant.”
Lorenzo, 48, of Santa Clara, contacted St. George police the next day to report the young woman, who she claimed had no underwear on under her mini skirt and was exposing herself in front of children, and saying she had pulled down the woman’s skirt to cover her genitalia, according to a probable cause affidavit filed in support of Lorenzo’s arrest.
Instead, the officer questioned Lorenzo, asking why she had touched the young woman, especially if Lorenzo believed she was a minor.
Police were contacted the next day by the young woman in the video, who reported she had been sexually assaulted, the officer wrote. Seven additional witnesses also spoke to police.
The young woman told the officer Lorenzo approached her “while her back was turned to her, and without any notice, or formal warning, she felt cold hands go up her skirt, touching her buttocks before she felt her skirt being pulled on,” according to the affidavit.
The officer wrote that he confirmed the woman had been wearing underwear and shorts beneath the skirt, which the woman said would make any inappropriate exposure “impossible.”
An initial court appearance for Lorenzo is scheduled on June 19.
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