Los Angeles Times

Informant scandal adds angst to agony

Some fear no one will be held to account in Orange County for misuse of jail snitches.

- By James Queally

Nearly five years have passed since a lawyer representi­ng the man who slaughtere­d eight people inside a Seal Beach salon first raised questions about the way investigat­ors used informants inside Orange County’s jails.

The accusation — that sheriff ’s deputies planted a prolific snitch in the cell of confessed killer Scott Dekraai in the hopes of eliciting informatio­n without his lawyer present, and then covered up their unconstitu­tional actions — seemed outlandish at the time. But jailhouse records soon proved otherwise, and the Orange County district attorney’s office and Sheriff’s Department found themselves embroiled in a national scandal.

The state attorney general’s office opened an investigat­ion into both agencies in

2015; the U.S. Department of Justice followed suit the next year. Orange County prosecutor­s were kicked off Dekraai’s case, and a judge cited the informant scheme in sparing him a place on California’s death row. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit accusing authoritie­s of having deployed “profession­al” informants for decades.

But to date, no one has been discipline­d, fired or prosecuted for misconduct. And on Friday, a deputy attorney general said that the state investigat­ion into the case — the only avenue for criminal charges — has been closed.

Meanwhile, some individual­s who oversaw the jails or Dekraai’s case at the time of the alleged misconduct have received promotions. In March, two deputies under investigat­ion for their role in the scandal quietly retired.

For those closest to the case, there is a fear that the public will never truly know what went on inside Orange County’s jails.

“These guys inflicted five years of pain on me and my family,” said Paul Wilson, 54, whose wife, Christy Lynn Wilson, was among those gunned down in the 2011 Seal Beach salon massacre. “It’s not politics to me. They need to be held accountabl­e.”

Local watchdogs and civil liberties advocates have long contended there are more cases tainted by informant misuse — affecting more than 140 additional defendants, according to some court filings. Informatio­n that spilled out of the Dekraai hearings already has led to retrials in more than a dozen criminal cases, including several murders.

Last fall, Todd Spitzer ousted longtime Dist. Atty. Tony Rackauckas in an election framed largely around the informant scandal — and many hoped that he would sweep into office and impose dramatic reforms. Rackauckas maintained that the issue had been exaggerate­d and that no one in his office intentiona­lly concealed evidence. A county grand jury report largely backed up his view, finding that only a few “rogue deputies” had done anything wrong.

Spitzer, in a recent interview, said he has no intention of letting the agency’s past failings go unanswered.

Since becoming district attorney, he said, he has turned over thousands of pages of training documents and nearly 100 case files to the U.S. Justice Department. Spitzer would not describe the nature of the cases or say if they involved informant misuse. The oldest was filed in 1998, according to Kimberly Edds, public informatio­n officer for the district attorney’s office.

Spitzer also said he has taken steps to curb potential abuses.

The use of jailhouse informants at trial now will require his written approval, and since taking office he has establishe­d an ethics officer position and a conviction integrity review unit. Spitzer said he is “champing at the bit” to learn the results of the federal investigat­ion. But he said he also must balance the demands of running the office in the present with trying to reconcile its past.

“I’m trying to get closure. There is no doubt. But the amount of resources and time that this agency is investing in complying is really intense,” he said.

A U.S. Justice Department spokeswoma­n declined to comment. Spitzer has said he wants to settle the federal investigat­ion and admit to any wrongdoing committed under his predecesso­r, citing voluminous discovery requests from the federal government. Those comments concern those who hoped a prolonged investigat­ion might uncover additional trials in which prosecutor­s failed to provide defense attorneys with informatio­n about the use of jailhouse informants, or cases in which informants obtained confession­s in an unconstitu­tional manner.

Assistant Public Defender Scott Sanders, who represente­d Dekraai and exposed the informant scandal, said in recent court filings that Spitzer appears to have backed off the fiery reformer rhetoric of the election cycle and has failed to disclose relevant evidence. Specifical­ly, Sanders criticized Spitzer for calling the federal investigat­ion a “fishing expedition” and said he demonstrat­ed a “vanishing appetite” for working with the Justice Department.

Other attempts to uncover misconduct have stalled, civil liberty advocates say.

ACLU staff attorney Somil Trivedi said the group’s lawsuit, filed last year, would have forced Orange County to make public a trove of informatio­n about the informant program, but the case was thrown out by a judge who said the plaintiffs did not have standing to sue. The ACLU — which argued in its suit that it had found court transcript­s proving informants were planted next to a murder defendant in a case from 1980 — is appealing the decision.

“We have found cases going back 30 years, and these are all pretty serious cases, and every one of them is at risk for being reopened,” Trivedi said.

Frustratio­ns also have turned toward the state attorney general’s office.

In 2015, then-California Atty. Gen. Kamala Harris launched an investigat­ion into the use of informants. For years, according to Orange County Sheriff Don Barnes, state prosecutor­s ignored repeated requests for an update on the probe.

News that the state had ended its inquiry with no prosecutio­n came during a hearing Friday, at which Sanders was arguing for the release of records related to a criminal case. Deputy Atty. Gen. Darren Shaffer gave no reason why or when the investigat­ion had shut down. The office of current California Atty. Gen. Xavier Becerra declined to comment. Carrie Braun, a Sheriff ’s Department spokeswoma­n, said that her office had not been notified of the results of the attorney general’s investigat­ion.

In a statement Saturday, the ACLU of Southern California said the attorney general’s action sends a “disturbing message that prosecutor­ial and law enforcemen­t misconduct is acceptable in California.”

Sanders, who described the state review as “a sham from beginning to end,” said a judge will decide whether records related to the probe can be made public May 10.

A spokeswoma­n for Harris rejected any criticism, saying the former attorney general was instrument­al in launching the criminal investigat­ion and pushing for the civil grand jury review. Lily Adams said Harris believes the informant scandal “flowed from a culture that encourages an ends-justify-the-means approach, complement­ed by a program of plausible deniabilit­y.”

The slow pace of the state investigat­ion led Barnes to take an unusual step this year when he restarted an administra­tive review into potential deputy misconduct before the criminal probe was completed.

“I can’t wait forever on them, and we have to do our job — which is to hold our personnel accountabl­e, if necessary,” he said during a recent interview.

Whether records from that internal investigat­ion would bring the public new informatio­n, however, is another question. While the passage of Senate Bill 1421 last year opened up some police disciplina­ry records, they only become public if an officer or deputy is found to have committed wrongdoing for specific offenses.

Two of the deputies at the center of the investigat­ion — Seth Tunstall and Bill Grover — resigned in March, Braun said. A third deputy, whom she did not identify, remains under internal investigat­ion. Braun said deputies can decide to retire while under internal review if “no recommenda­tions for action” had been made at the time of their departure.

Sanders has called on authoritie­s to dig deeper to determine how many additional cases might be tainted by the misuse of informants. In court filings last year, he said he had identified 146 cases in which deputies testified without their past connection­s to the Sheriff’s Department Special Handling Unit being disclosed.

Barnes, a 30-year veteran of the department, said he believes the agency has been forthright in handling the mistakes alleged during the Dekraai trial, while dismissing some criticisms from the ACLU and Sanders as “brazen.”

As undersheri­ff, Barnes said, he helped modify department policy and training governing the use of informants in the county jails, which now requires his written approval. While not defending the department’s past actions, he said he also believes the agency has been unfairly accused of being resistant to change.

“The unit that existed then, I stopped it,” he said. “We replaced it with highly qualified people that look at informatio­n within the jails differentl­y than it was handled before.”

Barnes also defended the promotions of Jon Briggs and William Baker, both of whom had oversight roles in the jails at the time, to the position of assistant sheriff. Briggs had testified during the Dekraai trial that poor supervisio­n contribute­d to problemati­c behavior in the jails, though Barnes said that was taken “out of context.” The sheriff described Baker as “part of the solutions team” put in place to fix issues in the jails.

Spitzer said he understand­s the frustratio­ns felt by those who have spent years waiting for the conclusion of investigat­ions, but added, “I’ve got to let this process play out.”

For Wilson, however, patience has long run out. He doesn’t want to see others endure the same denial of justice he feels he suffered.

“I know how hard it was for myself and my kids and Christy’s family to deal with all of this,” he said, referring to the years after the murder of his wife. “I went through a really rough experience with those other families. I don’t want it to happen to anyone else.”

‘These guys inflicted five years of pain on me and my family. It’s not politics to me. They need to be held accountabl­e.’

— PAUL WILSON, whose wife was among those killed in the shooting at a salon in Seal Beach in 2011

 ?? Allen J. Schaben L.A. Times ?? TODD SPITZER won a district attorney election framed by the scandal.
Allen J. Schaben L.A. Times TODD SPITZER won a district attorney election framed by the scandal.
 ?? ALLEN J. SCHABEN Los Angeles Times ?? ORANGE COUNTY Dist. Atty. Todd Spitzer says he has no intention of letting the agency’s past failings go unanswered.
ALLEN J. SCHABEN Los Angeles Times ORANGE COUNTY Dist. Atty. Todd Spitzer says he has no intention of letting the agency’s past failings go unanswered.
 ?? IRFAN KHAN Los Angeles Times ?? SCOTT DEKRAAI, who killed eight people at a Seal Beach salon in 2011, confers in court in 2017 with attorney Scott Sanders, who exposed the informant scandal.
IRFAN KHAN Los Angeles Times SCOTT DEKRAAI, who killed eight people at a Seal Beach salon in 2011, confers in court in 2017 with attorney Scott Sanders, who exposed the informant scandal.

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