Deputy DA lied — and then things went downhill fast

Prosecutor falsely said he was in a serious car wreck

OAKLAND >> Just one day after revealing a serious credibility issue with the alleged victim in a rape case he was prosecuting, a then-Alameda County deputy district attorney sent an email to the judge and defense attorney claiming to be his own wife, reporting he’d been in a serious car wreck and needed to delay the trial, according to court records recently obtained by this newspaper.

There was just one problem with his story: It wasn’t true. The lie quickly unraveled days later — and so did the case he was trying — when a high-ranking DA official came to court and admitted the prosecutor’s falsehood in a public hearing, moments after trying and failing to keep the matter away from the public’s view.

The prosecutor who sent the email — former Deputy District Attorney Keydon Levy — is no longer with the office and now works for a private Bay Area firm, records show. A spokeswoman for the DA’s Office refused to say whether he was fired or quit. But a court transcript from the August hearing where the lie became public indicates that the DA’s Office was considering discipline for Levy at the time.

Court records and transcripts show that as Levy’s story began to crumble, other prosecutors in the office tried to get the defendant to accept 12-15 years in state prison. After the truth about the email came out in a public hearing, the defendant accepted a prison term of four years and most of the charges against him were dismissed. He originally had faced a potential life sentence.

Levy did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

The bizarre controversy started last summer when Levy was preparing to try a man named Van Le Tran, who’d been accused of violently kidnapping and sexually assaulting a woman known in court records as Jane Doe. As jury selection began last August, Levy offered Tran’s attorney a plea deal and a 25-year prison term, which the defense rejected, court records show.

But on Aug. 12, Levy revealed to the defense a key detail that benefited their case: Doe had been arrested on suspicion of a violent crime, a carjacking, just a month earlier. Though she never was charged, the arrest could have been used to attack Doe’s credibility on the witness stand. Levy claimed he had just become aware of the arrest. But at that point, the defense already had accused prosecutors of failing to turn over key discovery — including DNA evidence and Tran’s recorded statements to police — and from March to June sent seven emails about the matter to Levy.

Then, on 4:45 a.m. Aug. 13, hours before jury selection was set to continue, an email was sent to the judge, another prosecutor and Tran’s attorney from Levy’s work account. It read: “I am (Levy’s) wife and I know your names because he discussed you as he was preparing for his trial. I want to preface this by saying he will be okay, but that he was in a very severe car crash last night and will need time to recover. He would have wanted to have you informed as I know how seriously he takes his work.”

In Levy’s absence, Alameda County prosecutors attempted to settle the case, and the number of years in prison being offered got lower and lower. Levy’s original offer of 25 years turned to 15 after his no-show, then it went down to 12 years. During the negotiations, no one

told Tran’s attorney, Deputy Public Defender Tiffany Danao, that the lead prosecutor avoided trying the case by telling a blatant lie to a judge, Danao later would say in a court hearing, though it is unclear exactly when prosecutors discovered this themselves.

But on Aug. 21, Chief Assistant District Attorney Kevin Dunleavy appeared in court on Tran’s case to make the lie known. At first, he tried to persuade Judge Thomas Rogers to have a sealed discussion on the matter, in the judge’s chambers, saying it related to “confidential and sensitive” information. But the judge wasn’t having it and insisted that the hearing be done in public because it had to do with potential “prosecutorial misconduct,” adding that there was a chance Levy would be called as a witness due to the “discovery issues” involved, according to a transcript of the hearing.

Dunleavy then said the DA’s Office was treating it as a personnel matter and that Levy had not only been pulled from the case but he was “currently off of work.”

“No final discipline has been arrived at, but I want to represent to the court that with regard to the email, the email was sent by Keydon Levy, it was not sent by his wife, and that he was not in a very severe car crash,” Dunleavy then said. “Those are the two representations that were made, so the court is in receipt of communication from Mr. Levy on that specific issue. I am here to advise the court that the information that he provided you in that email was false.”

Minutes later, a plea deal was finalized: Tran accepted a forced sodomy conviction and received four years in state prison. The remaining sexual assault charges and special allegations that he kidnapped Doe were dismissed. Before taking the deal, Danao noted that she was hearing of Levy’s lie for the first time and that it hadn’t come up days earlier when prosecutors tried to persuade her to accept a plea deal sending Tran to state prison for more than a decade, according to the transcript.

Asked for comment on the matter last month, DA’s Office spokeswoman Anna Kelly would only confirm Levy’s departure from the office, adding in an email, “beyond that, I cannot nor will I comment on Mr. Levy.” Speaking generally, Kelly pointed this newspaper to a video about the ethical standards of the office, titled “Pride and Professionalism.”

“The Alameda County District Attorney’s Office demands the highest level of integrity, honesty and professionalism from all of its employees,” Kelly said in the email. “This office has been identified as one of the best prosecutor offices in the United States.”