Peoria resident Richard Maloney is upset that a California woman told police he'd threatened her and was in the Hells Angels, so he's suing her for $100,000.
Maloney filed a lawsuit in federal court on Wednesday, acting as his own attorney. In it, he states that Lois Kropp of Oceano, California, and her daughter had told police he was making phone threats against her. Now he's listed in police databases as a gang member, and it's hurting his reputation, he claims.
He's suing for defamation, libel, civil conspiracy and negligence.
Kropp, 77, tells New Times that Maloney did harass her, and that her daughter -- whom Maloney had once dated -- told her that Maloney bragged about formerly being a Hells Angels' member.
Maloney's lawsuit states that a deputy called him in January, telling him that Kropp had reported that he was a Hells Angels' member who had been making threats against her over the phone.
The deputy told him that if anything happened to Kropp or her daughter, authorities would be coming after him. Then, in June, he received a call from a Washington state police officer who informed him that Kropp's daughter had complained that Maloney was harassing her mother.
Maloney claims he's never never phone Kropp to make any threats. And, he says in the suit, he not a member of the Hells Angels.
Kropp says she doesn't know if Maloney, a disabled former sailor, is in the Hells Angels now, but he once claimed to be.
The tension between the two began last year, after Kropp's daughter broke off a relationship with Maloney, who also has a home in California, Kropp says.
She says he called late at night months ago, pretending to be someone else and demanding her daughter's new address. Kropp recognized his voice, she says. He told her he was with the Hells Angels and that "we" were outside the house. She checked outside after hanging up, but no one was there. On another call, he threatened to shoot her, she claims.
Once when he called, she was on the phone with him when her daughters arrived at her home. They immediately called the sheriff's office, which dispatched a deputy. The deputy came over while she was still on the phone with Maloney and talked to him, she says.
Maloney's trying to sue her daughter in Washington, Kropp says. She views the new lawsuit in Arizona as continued harassment.
"It's another bunch of his crap," she says. "There's no way I'm going to pay ($100,000)."
Maloney, the alleged victim of Kropp, hasn't yet returned our voice mail.