Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Shea Sanna was assigned to prosecute James Tubbs for violently sexually assaulting a child in the bathroom of a Denny’s restaurant in Palmdale, California, in 2014. Tubbs was just two weeks shy of his 18th birthday at the time he committed the crime, but wasn’t caught until 2019 when his DNA was found at the scene of another violent assault, cracking the cold case. Charges were filed in 2020, shortly after George Gascón took office and instituted a blanket policy prohibiting prosecutors in his office from seeking to try any juvenile as an adult, for any crime, in any situation, even a situation like this:

Prosecutors say Tubbs walked into the bathroom of a Denny’s in 2014 and grabbed the 10-year-old by the throat, locked her in a stall, and put her hand down the girl’s pants. Tubbs stopped when another person walked into the restroom.

Even though the details of the crime were chilling, even though Tubbs was nearly 18 at the time the crime was committed, and even though Tubbs had gone on to violently assault other people, Sanna was not allowed to seek to try Tubbs as an adult. Since Tubbs was 26 when sentenced, the maximum sentence he could receive was two years in a juvenile facility — meaning that most likely Tubbs would be out within six months — and he wouldn’t have to register as a sex offender.

Sanna had clashed with supervisors over Gascon’s policy, arguing vehemently that the circumstances of this case were such that Tubbs should be tried as an adult. Gascon’s administration held firm, and when the public found out what was happening Gascon, who was facing recall at the time, was vilified. Sanna has also spoken out publicly against his boss, and for that he’s been subjected to almost a year of retaliation by Gascon’s administration, including being under internal investigation for seven months for unspecified “misuse of county resources” and “misgendering” Tubbs.

Here's what his own prosecutors have to say about him👇@sanna_shea: "George Gascón is dangerous. He put a murderer/repeat child sexual predator in a juvenile facility with kids. Then he tried to silence everyone who tried to speak up."
👉@DAGasconRecall https://t.co/eMstxhBEW7 pic.twitter.com/Ls9HoTwja3

— New American Republic (@LibertysRoar) May 13, 2022

Sanna tweeted on May 10:

“George Gascón is dangerous. He put a murderer/repeat child sexual predator in a juvenile facility with kids. Then he tried to silence everyone who tried to speak up.”

So, why “misgendering”? Shortly after Tubbs was arrested and jailed for the 2014 assault, he started identifying as female and requested to be referred to as “Hannah.” Sanna warned supervisors that Tubbs, was potentially attempting to work the system by claiming to be transgender in order to receive preferential treatment, but instead of taking that warning to heart, supervisors claim that’s one instance of Sanna habitually misgendering and deadnaming Tubbs and believe he should be disciplined for that.

As the public learned shortly after Tubbs’ sentencing, that was exactly what Tubbs was doing. Fox News’ Bill Melugin exclusively reported about jailhouse calls between Tubbs and his father in which Tubbs admitted as much:

Explicit Los Angeles jailhouse recordings of Hannah Tubbs, the 26-year-old trans child molester who received a slap on the wrist last month after pleading guilty to molesting a 10-year-old in 2014, depict her admitting it was wrong to attack a little girl but gloating over the light punishment.

She boasted that nothing would happen to her after she pleaded guilty due to Democrat District Attorney George Gascon’s policies and laughed that she won’t have to go back to prison or register as a sex offender. She also made explicit remarks about the victim that are unfit to print.

“I’m gonna plead out to it, plead guilty,” Tubbs says in one recording. “They’re gonna stick me on probation, and it’s gonna be dropped, it’s gonna be done, I won’t have to register, won’t have to do nothing.”

“You won’t have to register?” her father asks on the other line later in the conversation.

“I won’t have to do none of that,” Tubbs replies.

“So what are they going to do to you then?”

“Nothing,” Tubbs answers, then laughs.

Tubbs even had to remind people to use female pronouns when they refer to him in court, to further the deception.

So now they’re going to put me with other trannies that have seen their cases like mine or with one tranny like me that has a case like mine,” Tubbs says. “So when you come to court, make sure you address me as her.”

Then she says that if she goes to prison she’s getting a sex change surgery to go into the women’s facility, and the other person says, “There’s some b—es in there too.”

On Friday, Fox News reported that Sanna had been suspended by Gascon for “misgendering” and “deadnaming” Tubbs. In an exclusive interview with RedState, Sanna said that while the information he was given earlier this week did list alleged instances of misgendering and deadnaming Tubbs, what he was really being suspended for is speaking out against the Gascon administration and that this five-day suspension is part of the ongoing retaliation he’s faced for almost a year now.

I was suspended for speaking out against the Gascón Administration. Misgendering Tubbs while informing them that they were being played is just their excuse for the suspension.https://t.co/MNMDrHoWn7

— Shea Sanna (@sanna_shea) February 24, 2023

Sanna told RedState that in July 2022 an internal investigation was opened against him, alleging that he that he misused county resources, released confidential information and made inappropriate public statements. Though he’s been through “more than 10 hours of interrogation” by the private attorneys retained by Gascon (at taxpayer expense) to conduct the investigation, he’s never been provided with any specific instances of alleged misuse of resources, alleged confidential information released, or alleged inappropriate public statements. Sanna told RedState that the private investigators are permitted to interrogate him any time they want, and that he is required to comply.

Then on Wednesday, Feb 22, Sanna was ordered to meet with Gascon’s Chief of Staff, Joseph Iniguez, in the downtown office and during that meeting was told that the office had conducted a separate investigation into his conduct and as a result of that investigation Sanna was being suspended for five days without pay for misgendering.

According to the packet Iniguez gave Sanna, Sanna had “misgendered” Tubbs on a January 26, 2022 internal Zoom call Sanna attended with Chief Deputy District Attorney Sharon Woo and approximately three other Deputy District Attorneys. Sanna tells RedState that he didn’t speak during that call and that witnesses also state that “they don’t remember [Sanna] saying a word.”

Sanna also displayed a transphobic attitude, according to the suspension packet, when he told supervisors prior to Tubbs’ sentencing that Tubbs might be attempting to game the system to get preferential treatment in custody. And when Sanna’s attorney explained his position to Gascon’s office, that Sanna wasn’t being malicious with that warning, but rather trying to point out something that should be taken into consideration when the office went before the judge on sentencing, Sanna said that his attorney’s remarks were also listed as a reasoning to discipline Sanna for transphobic comments.

Gascon’s former Chief of Staff, Victoria Adams, filed suit against Gascon in December 2022, and one portion of her lawsuit deals with conflict over the Tubbs case, in which Adams stood up for Sanna.

According to the suit, Adams clashed with Gascón and Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Sharon Woo because the original prosecutor on the case, Shea Sanna, had been barred from appearing at an April 2022 hearing related to Tubbs’ detention after the plea deal was struck. Adams believed the prosecutor replacing Sanna would not be informed enough about the case to make a proper representation at the hearing. But she was rebuffed by Woo and Gascón.

What additional retaliation Sanna will face for speaking to the press about his treatment remains to be seen, but Gascon should know that we’re all watching, and that his attention should be on actually locking up criminals.