Many weigh in after board questions credentials of Sarsfield’s
volunteer investigator
A claim against the San Benito D.A.’s office has led to multiple
special board meetings and a public rancor typical of the county’s
turbulent political waters.
Sheriff Curtis Hill said that as far back as a year ago he made
inquiries to the supervisors about Sarsfield’s volunteer
investigator, Andy Simpson, following his own investigation to
determine if Simpson was qualified by the state to be a peace
officer. At that time, Hill said, his findings showed Simpson had
not received a diploma from the Peace Officers Standards and
Training Academy, the basic training for anyone with a cop’s
badge.
Many weigh in after board questions credentials of Sarsfield’s volunteer investigator
A claim against the San Benito D.A.’s office has led to multiple special board meetings and a public rancor typical of the county’s turbulent political waters.
Sheriff Curtis Hill said that as far back as a year ago he made inquiries to the supervisors about Sarsfield’s volunteer investigator, Andy Simpson, following his own investigation to determine if Simpson was qualified by the state to be a peace officer. At that time, Hill said, his findings showed Simpson had not received a diploma from the Peace Officers Standards and Training Academy, the basic training for anyone with a cop’s badge.
Hill said that at the time, a year ago in December, the D.A. told him and the board Simpson would no longer be working for his office. The D.A. apparently got around the issue when, after that, Simpson became an unpaid volunteer for his office.
“Every single member of the law enforcement community in this county has the same concern,” Hill said. “We want to know if someone is running around acting as a police officer with full law enforcement authority, without the credentials. When I turn around it’s back on the radar screen. So when it came up the second time, I said, ‘That’s it. I’m making a formal request (that the board get involved).'”
Public Defender Greg LaForge got in on the claim late last week when he warned Sarsfield about using Simpson in a letter which he copied and sent to county officials. LaForge also says Simpson, a volunteer gumshoe, does not have the proper credentials to be involved in attempted prosecutions.
District Attorney John Sarsfield dismissed the flap as “much ado about nothing,” but the San Benito Board of Supervisors seems to be taking the claim quite seriously. During a special board meeting convened on Monday, former Interim County Counsel Claude Biddle verbally sparred with Sarsfield over whether the issue should be discussed in an open meeting or behind closed doors.
“There is a threat of litigation,” Biddle said to Sarsfield, referring to the possibility of yet another lawsuit lobbed against the county, this time from its own Public Defender. “It’s not a hollow one.”
Hill agreed that the issue is huge, and could potentially jeopardize any county cases that Simpson has worked on.
This latest legal dustup erupted after LaForge shot a letter last week to Sarsfield – with copies sent throughout county administration, as well as the Sheriff’s Department, Hollister Police Department and both the county’s superior court judges – speaking on behalf of his client Mike Keith, owner of MK Ballistics. Law enforcement officials from the federal, state and county levels recently raided Keith’s non-lethal munitions factory, located on Santa Ana Valley Road, and Simpson was among the officers who investigated the operation. LaForge claims Simpson has not obtained what’s known in law enforcement as POST certification – Peace Officer Standards and Training, a state-issued requirement for peace officers – and that Simpson therefore “intentionally mislead the court by falsely stating that he is a peace officer.” In the same letter, LaForge threatened to file a suit against the county on Keith’s behalf.
At the special board meeting held earlier this week, Sarsfield gave the board a packet of documents that included legal opinions on Simpson’s status as an investigator, as well as copies of Simpson’s certificate of training from a POST academy at Yuba College in Marysville. The certificate indicates Simpson completed 600 hours of training, and other documents show the investigator made the POST honors list.
But Simpson’s training was not enough to earn him full POST accreditation, says Hill and other law enforcement heads, including Hollister Chief of Police Jeff Miller. Sarsfield counters that Simpson is an unpaid volunteer investigator for his office, so the full POST endorsement is not necessary.
That almost makes it worse, said Hill.
“Does anyone living in this county feel that it’s OK for someone to come on their property executing a search and seizure, wthout the proper authority?” he said rhetorically. “All we want is the truth.”
The D.A. has referred the matter to the state Attorney General’s office for a final opinion, but does not expect the higher office to make a finding for at least a month.
In the meantime, county supervisors wrestled over whether they should discuss the matter before the public or in closed session.
“This has to be in closed session,” insisted Supervisor Jaime De La Cruz, before the board went into the back chambers. When they emerged again, attorney Biddle announced they would take up the matter in an open session Friday afternoon, just after The Pinnacle’s press deadline. Biddle has since left his interim post as county counsel, and it is unclear who is in charge of the county office now. Calls to the department went unanswered, and County Administrative Officer Susan Thompson was unavailable for comment.
While Sarsfield appeared amiable toward the board during the Monday meeting, his tone had changed by midweek. He vowed he would combat LaForge’s charge vigorously, and said he was disgusted that the supervisors had even deliberated over the matter.
“The threat of LaForge’s litigation is a sham,” Sarsfield said, adding he believes he is being harassed.
In a post meeting comment Supervisor Chair Pat Loe said, “I don’t think this is a board issue.”
Since Monday, what at first seemed to be a difference of professional opinions over a minor issue has escalated into a bizarre political sandtrap, with elected officials throughout town taking sides on the issue. When Sheriff Curtis Hill replied to a media query saying the issue should be investigated, Sarsfield went on the offensive.
Sarsfield sent a letter to the board calling LaForge’s remarks “defamatory and false,” and since the public defender is a county employee, he wrote, LaForge was inviting a lawsuit from Simpson upon the county. He also inferred that Hill’s comments, as well as similar ones made by Supervisor Reb Monaco, were “ill-considered.”
“In the process a good person has been severely harmed for blatantly political reasons,” Sarsfield wrote.
When asked by a reporter what it was that set the D.A. off, Monaco said: “There’s a lot I don’t understand about this whole thing. I don’t think I said anything damning to the D.A. But I’m not a law enforcement officer so I’m not going to comment on any of it.”
Attached to the letter to the board, Sarsfield included a formal opinion from attorney Roy Hubert of the California District Attorney’s Association. Hubert, who worked with Simpson on the MK Ballistics case and others as a special environmental prosecutor for the county, defended the investigator’s status as a peace officer and cited case law in his argument.
By Wednesday, it appeared that all the players involved had “lawyered up,” including Simpson, who hired legal hotshot Phillip Berry of Oakland, the attorney representing former Planning Director Rob Mendiola in a separate and ongoing civil lawsuit against the anonymous Los Valientes group. According to various sources, LaForge has hired his former boss, local attorney Harry Damkar, who was the previous D.A. for 16 years.
Sarsfield told The Pinnacle he intended to speak to the board again during the open meeting on Friday, where he planned to blast the county officials whom he believes “slandered” Simpson.
Hill said Sarsfield should have stuck to his word a year ago.
“It could have been handled so easily a year ago,” Hill said. “What kind of positions are we placing ourselves in? Are we going to open this up to a political fight, just to answer a simple question?”
Loe echoed the notion when she said the infighting among key county figures is not moving the community forward.
“San Benito County and its elected officials have got to get beyond all this pettiness and get down to doing the business of the people,” she said.
