Ex-police union leader’s explosive charge against D.A. Gascón

District Attorney George Gascon (center) makes his way to a press conference where he will announce the filing of a felony and misdemeanor charges against three former and one current deputy, in San Francisco, California, on Tuesday, March 1, 2016. less District Attorney George Gascon (center) makes his way to a press conference where he will announce the filing of a felony and misdemeanor charges against three former and one current deputy, in San Francisco, ... more Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, Special To The Chronicle Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, Special To The Chronicle Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Ex-police union leader’s explosive charge against D.A. Gascón 1 / 3 Back to Gallery

As police chief, San Francisco’s crusading District Attorney George Gascón was plenty close with the police union he now criticizes as obstructionist and was largely unconcerned about Police Department diversity — and even made a few racially disparaging remarks during a booze-fueled night out with union leaders.

Those are some of the assertions in a sworn declaration submitted by Gary Delagnes, the former president of the Police Officers Association, to a blue-ribbon task force that Gascón set up to look into allegations of racism and homophobia in the department.

Delagnes submitted his declaration on Tuesday, eight days after Gascón’s Feb. 22 appearance before the panel, where he testified that the police union “influences the ability for a chief of police or frankly even a Police Commission to effectuate reform” — and not for the better.

Delagnes spent 25 years on the force and was POA president for nine years before retiring in 2013. He was known for throwing verbal punches, and in his declaration he saves the haymaker for the end.

He recounts a 2010 dinner with Gascón, current POA President Martin Halloran and another union representative in Cambridge, Mass., where the group was attending a police union leadership forum organized by Harvard Law School.

“During that dinner, Chief Gascón, who was drinking heavily, began reminiscing on his time with the Los Angeles Police Department,” Delagnes said. “He made multiple statements that disparaged minorities. He became so loud and animated that an African American patron approached Chief Gascón and asked him to restrain himself because his behavior was offending his family.”

Photo: Gabrielle Lurie, Special To The Chronicle District Attorney George Gascon makes an announcement of criminal...

In an interview, Halloran backed up Delagnes’ account. But Delagnes doesn’t give specifics, and Halloran wouldn’t, either.

“The declaration speaks for itself,” Halloran said.

Delagnes told us, “If called as a witness by Gascon’s blue-ribbon panel, I will testify in more detail about those statements.”

When provided a copy of the sworn declaration, spokesman Alex Bastian of the district attorney’s office didn’t directly respond to Delagnes’ charge or any other assertions in the document. Bastian said only, “What he (Delagnes) lacks in credibility, he makes up for in imagination.”

In his statement, Delagnes said he had decided to speak up after reading that Gascón told the blue-ribbon panel that he was “much more worried today” about the state of the Police Department than when he was chief from 2009 to 2011.

Delagnes said that as far as he could see, Gascón had few issues with the rank and file or the leaders of its union when he ran the department.

According to Delagnes, he and the chief routinely met or spoke on the phone two or three times a week.

“These meetings and conversations concerned all aspects of the Police Department, not just POA matters,” Delagnes said. “The conversations were always candid, no holds barred. They were very productive.

“We eventually had dinner several times and met for coffee on Tuesdays,” said Delagnes, who was even invited to the chief’s wedding.

“Throughout his tenure, and often at our dinner meetings, Chief Gascón and I resolved the vast majority of outstanding disciplinary actions” involving police officers, Delagnes said. “He could not have been more fair. He never criticized the discipline system, or the POA’s approach to it, to me.”

Delagnes added, “Not once during all of our candid conversations did Chief Gascón ever state that he believed racial, gender, sexual orientation or other bias afflicted the SFPD. Nor did I ever hear of him expressing such a belief or perception to anyone else. Nor do I recall him undertaking any initiatives to improve diversity at any level within the SFPD.

“His testimony and public comments now are at odds with how he conducted himself when he served as chief,” Delagnes said.

And although Gascón told the blue-ribbon panel that “most of the command staff were born and raised in the city,” something that created “a really tight-knit structure that precluded an objective look into the organization,” Delagnes said the former chief had contributed to that.

Gascón “complains about an old boys’ network — yet his promotions to the command staff were almost invariably graduates of San Francisco Catholic high schools or Lowell,” Delagnes said.

And, in a parting shot, Delagnes recalled a lunch with Gascón in spring 2011 in which the newly named D.A. said he was going to oppose Greg Suhr’s pending appointment as police chief.

“I told him that his opposition to Greg Suhr was not supported by the POA and, if he objected, the POA would likely not endorse his re-election as district attorney,” Delagnes said. “Chief Gascón then told me he would not oppose Greg Suhr.”

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