Four indicted in gun-permit scandal
Captain, three supporters of sheriff charged with conspiracy and bribery
SAN JOSE >> A grand jury has indicted a Santa Clara County sheriff’s captain and three political supporters of Sheriff Laurie Smith for allegedly brokering a pay-for-play scheme where campaign donations were exchanged for concealed-carry weapons permits.
Santa Clara County District Attorney Jeff Rosen announced felony charges including conspiracy and bribery against Capt. James Jensen; Christopher Schumb, an officer for a sheriff reelection committee and a prominent South Bay litigator; attorney Harpaul Nahal; and Milpitas gun-parts maker Michael Nichols. All four are accused of plotting to illegally secure concealedgun permits for Seattlebased executive security contractor AS Solution.
Rosen said Friday that an 18-month investigation
uncovered a two-tiered policy for the permits: a process for regular citizens whose applications were destined for a filing cabinet, and VIPs whose applications were fast-tracked for approval.
“My office’s concern is not whether the sheriff grants many or few CCW licenses, but whether they are being granted or denied for the wrong reasons,” Rosen said. “CCW licenses should not be given out in exchange for campaign donations. They should not be for sale.”
A criminal grand jury was impaneled in July and began convening about two weeks ago. When asked whether Smith or other commanders were involved, Rosen declined to comment, citing the active investigation.
“We are not done,” he added.
Jensen has been placed on administrative leave, the sheriff’s office said Friday, adding that “we will continue to monitor the situation and have no further information at this time.”
Harry Stern, the attorney representing Jensen, said in a statement that his client is “devastated” by the indictment. Stern also argued Jensen did not benefit from handling the AS Solution permits and alluded to the fact that Smith is the only person in the sheriff’s office who can approve a concealed gun permit.
“He doesn’t have the authority to grant permits nor did he receive anything for processing them,” Stern said.
Brian Jantzen, executive vice president for AS Solution, said the company “has provided its full cooperation” to the district attorney’s office but declined to comment on the indictment, citing the ongoing investigation.
“The AS Solution team is committed to ethical and lawful practices and full cooperation with law enforcement,” Jantzen said in a statement. “We are focused on continued service to our clients and ensuring that our ethical standards are upheld.”
Messages left for Schumb, Nahal and Nichols were not immediately returned Friday.
Multiple sources familiar with the CCW review process have told this news organization that the only qualification that approved applications had in common was a directive from Smith or one of her top commanders. Rejected or non-processed applications, sources said, often went into a drawer and weren’t looked at again.
Rev. Jethroe Moore, president of the San Jose-Silicon Valley NAACP chapter, says he was denied a permit renewal after he refused to support Smith’s 2018 reelection bid. Moore has called for Smith to step down.
“If you don’t play in her court, you don’t get one,” he said Friday. “This is a continued pattern of misleadership under her.”
Neither Martin Nielsen, the AS Solution executive who made the illicit donation, nor five other alleged co-conspirators who worked for the company at the time, including CEO Christian West, were the subject of indictment. When asked why they have not been charged despite being mentioned repeatedly in the current indictment, the district attorney’s office said “more charges are forthcoming.”
Rosen said his office began investigating Nielsen’s donation after an inquiry by the Metro Silicon Valley weekly newspaper. It was the only donation Nielsen ever made to support Smith and dwarfed all other donations to the committee.
Prosecutors allege Jensen worked with the other defendants to secure concealed-gun permits for “as many as 10 to 12” AS Solution employees in exchange for $90,000 in donations to support Smith’s reelection.
Financial disclosure records plainly show that in October 2018, an initial $45,000 donation was made by Nielsen — bankrolled by his company — to the Santa Clara County Public Safety Alliance, for which Schumb was assistant treasurer. Rosen said a second payment meant for the Sheriff’s Advisory Board was “forestalled” by the investigation.
Nielsen was granted a permit the following March, along with several of his colleagues.
According to the indictment, Nichols contacted Nahal in April 2018 to set up a meeting with Nielsen, whom Nichols described as a “buddy,” to help Nielsen secure CCW permits for his company’s executive protection agents, who protected high-profile figures such as Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg.
Nichols allegedly texted Nahal, “it’s a potential $50K.”
That led to a meeting between Nielsen, West, Nichols, Nahal and Schumb in May 2018 and led to Nielsen attending a “Best of the West” police skills competition hosted by the sheriff’s office soon after. At that event, prosecutors say Nichols introduced Nielsen to Jensen, and they “agreed in principle” to exchange political donations for concealed-carry permits.
Over the next month, a group of executive-protection agents were directed by AS Solution manager Jack Stromgren to list false employers and addresses to fulfill legal requirements that county concealed-gun permits can only be issued to county residents.
That October, a month before Smith’s toughest reelection vote since she took office in 1998, prosecutors say Nielsen, at the direction of Jensen, went to Schumb’s downtown San Jose law office and handed him a $45,000 check.
Jensen has also been charged with falsifying firearms proficiency forms for seven permit recipients: Nielsen and six people unrelated to the alleged AS Solution conspiracy, including county supervisor Mike Wasserman, whose office did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday. Prosecutors said the recipients’ permits were issued or renewed without having to complete the requalification requirements.
According to the indictment document, the grand jury saw three former and current sheriff public information officers whose jobs included handling gun permit applications. Jensen was a former PIO but was a lieutenant, and then captain, during the time that the alleged crimes took place. Smith, her secondin-command Undersheriff Rick Sung, Wasserman, several AS Solution employees and several permit recipients also gave testimony.
Whether Jensen was part of a line of supervisors over the years carrying out a corrupt system in issuing of gun permits could come in the grand jury transcript, which will be released in the coming weeks. The permits are bestowed at the sheriff’s discretion and given out relatively rarely compared to other counties in California, a selectivity that critics say paves the way for favor trading.