Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office hit with corruption probe over concealed weapons permits

A correction has been made to an earlier version of this story and has been appended to the end of the article.

The Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office served a search warrant at the Sheriff’s Office last week, as part of an apparent corruption probe into allegations of political favoritism in the agency’s issuing of concealed weapons permits, according to sources familiar with the investigation.

Prosecutors would say little about the investigation, other than that it was taking place.

“The DA’s Office retrieved certain items from the Sheriff’s Office pursuant to a search warrant signed by a Santa Clara County Superior Court judge,” the office said in an official statement about the Aug. 2 search. “The retrieved items are part of an ongoing investigation, and therefore, nothing more can be said at this time.”

But sources confirmed that the investigation involves an alleged “quid pro quo” between donors to six-term Sheriff Laurie Smith’s election efforts and people who have obtained concealed-carry weapons permits from her office, which has been relatively stingy about issuing the privilege compared to neighboring counties.

The sources also said that the probe, while publicly surfacing over the past few days, had been in the works far longer and that it is focused on some of Smith’s trusted advisers in the agency.

The investigation is being conducted by the DA’s Public Integrity Unit, which on its website states that it “supervises the investigation of cases involving corruption of public officials and employees in their official capacities or in the performance of their duties and initiates criminal charges when appropriate.”

The investigation was first reported by San Jose Inside. The Sheriff’s Office has confirmed that an investigation is in progress.

It might feel like déjà vu for Smith, whose office was the subject of a federal lawsuit in 2011 that also questioned how so-called concealed-carry permits are handed out. That lawsuit and an investigation by this news organization revealed that some recipients lived out of the county or out of the country and that political donors to Smith were well represented among the relatively scarce number of permits issued.

The county at the time denied any connection between the campaign donations and the permits, but the lawsuit nevertheless prompted a reexamination of the process for granting concealed carry permits. The County Counsel’s Office, which functions as the attorney for the Sheriff’s Office, declined comment on the current investigation and referred an inquiry to the DA’s office.

But a review of permits issued in 2018 — the only year for which records were immediately accessible — showed that at least four people whose permits were either issued or renewed donated to the sheriff’s re-election efforts in the last decade.

The Sheriff’s Office issued a statement Wednesday saying it was “aware of the District Attorney’s investigation and we are fully cooperating.”

The statement added, “Due to the fact this is an ongoing investigation, we are not going to disclose any additional information at this time. The Sheriff’s Office has made extensive efforts to increase transparency and trust with the communities we serve and will continue these efforts going forward.”

The Sheriff’s Office did not immediately respond to a request for the number of active CCW permits in the county, though the total has typically hovered between 100 and 150.

But at least four recipients of the 13 permits either issued or renewed last year donated at least $1,000 to Smith’s re-election efforts, including to her formal campaign or to the independent Santa Clara County Public Safety Alliance that supported her.

That includes match.com founder and Santa Clara County Valley Water District board member Gary Kremen, a Los Altos resident who donated $5,000 to the safety alliance group last fall, during Smith’s re-election bid for a sixth term. Stephen Bechtel Jr., of Bechtel Group, the international engineering and construction firm, had his CCW permit renewed every two years dating back to 1983, well before Smith was first elected in 1998.

Records show his grandson Blake Stephen Bechtel donated $1,000 to Smith’s 2014 re-election bid, as did his father Gary, a Morgan Hill resident. Other family members have also donated to Smith’s campaigns.

San Jose contractor James McDonald, who also got his permit renewed in 2018, donated $1,500 to Smith’s campaign over the past decade, records show.

None of those permit holders could be immediately reached in time for the print publication of this story. Thursday night, Gary Bechtel said his permit, which was renewed last year, is based on specific threats to him and his family. A previous renewal application by his father cited threats that go back more than 40 years, and other applications described dangers associated with running a prominent business.

The issue has long been a source of criticism for the Sheriff’s Office, and it has dogged Smith every time she has run for re-election in the last decade. Residents over the years have complained about the permitting process and said that the permits appeared to be reserved for high-profile people and VIP types.

That was the case for Chris Long, a 30-year-old county resident who said he never heard back from the agency when he applied for a CCW permit in 2013, and learned that other applicants similarly got no response. In January, he decided to doggedly pursue the process and chronicle his experience in a post on the online platform Medium. His application was eventually denied, more than six months after he first applied.

“It seems like they don’t actually process incoming applications,” Long said in an interview. “Effectively your application goes into a dumpster.”

In the process of pestering the Sheriff’s Office about his application — which under state law is supposed to yield a final decision within 90 days — Long obtained through a Public Records Act request the approved applications of 13 people from 2018. This news organization requested similar information in September 2018, during Smith’s re-election campaign, but never received any records.

The applications showed that longtime permit holders often did not have to articulate in detail their rationale for having a concealed handgun. Long said he made a “personal safety” argument for wanting a permit, and saw that several recipients said similar reasons and were able to obtain one. The Bechtels listed “family protection” and “family defense” as their reasons for their most recent renewals. McDonald stated that his remote ranch had become a haven for illegal marijuana grows. Kremen listed past threats to his life and the dangers of his travels to the California high desert.

That miffed Long.

“I’m happy that something is being done about this,” he said. “It’s an open secret there was a quid pro quo happening. It seems a fair amount of it is based in fact.”

Correction: August 9, 2019 An earlier version of this article incorrectly reported that campaign financial disclosures listed Stephen Bechtel as having donated $1,000 to Sheriff Laurie Smith’s 2014 re-election campaign. The listing was for his grandson, Blake Stephen Bechtel.

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