A multi-year felony investigation underneath former Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva into the company’s inspector basic — a probe {that a} authorized advisor for the county known as “not legally viable” — was based mostly largely on unfounded accusations that state and federal prosecutors repeatedly turned down, paperwork reviewed by The Instances present.
Villanueva lengthy used the case to attempt to discredit the county watchdog, commonly referring to Inspector Normal Max Huntsman as a “felony suspect” and asking county officers to take away him from the job at least twice. At one level, Villanueva cited the probe as a part of the justification to lock Huntsman out of division databases.
However in Could prosecutors with the state Division of Justice quietly notified the Sheriff’s Division in a memo that they might not file felony costs within the investigation launched in 2019.
The division has by no means totally defined the allegations in opposition to Huntsman and 4 different folks named as suspects. However an 80-page Sheriff’s Division report not too long ago reviewed by The Instances — a part of a greater than 300-page investigative case file — reveals investigators relentlessly pursued a probe targeted on supposedly stolen data and doc leaks.
Inspector Normal Max Huntsman listens to former Los Angeles County Sheriff Alex Villanueva’s testimony.
(Irfan Khan / Los Angeles Instances)
The felony investigation started quickly after Villanueva took workplace, when his transition group seen “abnormalities” whereas reviewing personnel data, in accordance with the report. In early 2019, the sheriff’s chief of employees requested inside felony investigators to look into it, and in 2021 the division despatched the case file to state prosecutors.
One prong of the investigation targeted on Huntsman’s issues that some personnel recordsdata, together with Villanueva’s, had been being stored secret from oversight officers. The division finally agreed to show them over, solely to analyze Huntsman for acquiring them, the report reveals.
The investigation additionally included allegations that oversight officers, in addition to the previous LASD constitutional policing advisor, Diana Teran, stole data of Villanueva and his high associates. Oversight officers have mentioned they had been entitled to entry confidential personnel recordsdata as a part of their jobs, and there’s no proof within the report that any of the recordsdata, downloaded in 2018, had been leaked to the press or improperly used.
The meandering report likens the alleged theft of Sheriff’s Division personnel data to pilfering from a McDonald’s charitable donation field or stealing the recipe for Coca-Cola. In some situations, the report factors to the quantity or frequency of downloads as proof of wrongdoing. In a single case, an oversight official’s choice to look eight recordsdata in someday is framed as a potential felony violation.
Due to the bizarre nature of the case, at one level attorneys for the county sought an outdoor authorized opinion. Retired federal prosecutor Lawrence Middleton warned them in 2020 that the division could possibly be “placing its workers in jeopardy by pursuing a felony investigation that, for my part, isn’t legally viable.”
The final time the division “determined to analyze its investigators,” Middleton continued, it “didn’t finish effectively for the division.” That was an obvious reference to a decade-old scandal wherein Sheriff Lee Baca and different high officers had been convicted in a scheme to hinder an FBI investigation of abuses in county jails.
The Sheriff’s Division dismissed Middleton’s authorized opinion, characterizing it in its report as a “clear and unambiguous risk” in opposition to these doing the investigating.
The division not too long ago confirmed that its investigation is now closed and mentioned there was “no further info” to launch.
“Our present administration operates distinctively from its predecessor,” the division wrote in an emailed assertion. “Actions taken in prior administrations don’t mirror our present insurance policies or practices.”
In an emailed response Thursday, Villanueva mentioned, “we by no means introduced the case to feds or the state, merely requested for his or her help.” He didn’t reply to particular questions, accused a reporter of against the law and mentioned attorneys for the county had been “making an attempt to hinder the case at each step.” The state Division of Justice mentioned it was “unable to touch upon investigations, closed or open.”
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Peace officer personnel data traditionally have been tightly protected against disclosure underneath state regulation and division coverage. However a long-standing written settlement between the division and the Workplace of Inspector Normal permits oversight officers to evaluation sure confidential recordsdata as a part of their duties, which embody monitoring deputy disciplinary instances, shootings and jail situations.
Within the fall of 2018, Workplace of Inspector Normal lawyer Bita Shasty seen {that a} case file she’d seen earlier than appeared to have vanished. She emailed Teran — then on the Sheriff’s Division — to ask if she remembered the case or knew why the file wouldn’t present up.
“It’s actually bizarre,” Shasty wrote. “I’m making an attempt to see for those who tried to tug up the case if it’s going to come up for you. Please let me know.”
About 20 minutes later, Teran defined that the file won’t be seen if it had been marked non-public for a “delicate” investigation. “Whether it is non-public to IAB [internal affairs] it’s so others within the division can’t pull it up,” she wrote, “however I’m certain they’re good with OIG having [a] copy.”
The next day, the report mentioned, a higher-ranking oversight official spoke with LASD Inside Affairs Bureau Capt. Josie Woolum concerning the hidden recordsdata. Woolum later emailed her assistant to recap the dialog, explaining that she’d informed the Workplace of Inspector Normal there have been 54 “Personal to IAB” recordsdata and that there was no formal course of to determine which of them could be marked non-public.
“Any government, or I, can determine to take action for a variety of enterprise causes,” she wrote.
A day later, Huntsman despatched a letter to then-Sheriff Jim McDonnell to say he hadn’t recognized the division might obscure such recordsdata from oversight officers. He mentioned he understood that the settlement signed years earlier gave oversight officers full entry to division personnel data, and that hiding recordsdata was “opposite to the intent” of the settlement.
“I request that you just present the Workplace of the Inspector Normal full and full entry,” he added.
For the following few weeks, officers went backwards and forwards concerning the recordsdata. Lastly, in late November 2018, the report says, Huntsman emailed Teran and his No. 2, Dan Baker, concerning the data. “Diana has permission from the sheriff (McDonnell) to offer us the recordsdata we search,” he wrote. “Please present her a tough drive so she will be able to obtain them.”
Teran responded: “Simply to be clear, I used to be solely approved to offer the recordsdata in closed instances, not pending.”
Citing unspecified “numerous legal guidelines,” the report alleges that at the same time as sheriff, McDonnell didn’t have the authority to permit the sharing of these recordsdata. At one level, the report says that when investigators tried to interview McDonnell, he invoked his Fifth Modification proper in opposition to self-incrimination.
Elsewhere, the report says that it wasn’t clear if he invoked that proper or “merely didn’t need to cooperate.” McDonnell — whose administration had lengthy been a goal of Villanueva’s criticism — declined to remark.
In early December 2018 — after a number of weeks of emails, calls and conferences between oversight and sheriff’s officers — Woolum despatched the recordsdata to Baker. Despite the fact that the division had in the end turned over the data willingly, the report alleges the Woolum had been “duped,” however didn’t present any proof of that.
In an interview Thursday, Woolum mentioned “there’s no means I might’ve been duped.”
“If I supplied any info to OIG or some other exterior entity, it might’ve been throughout the regular scope of enterprise, or it might have been on the course of somebody above me,” she added.
She didn’t bear in mind particular particulars concerning the trade of recordsdata, however mentioned she was by no means interviewed by the detective, Mark Lillienfeld, on the time. “That could be a big piece that’s lacking,” she mentioned. “It’s primary investigation 101. He missed a fantastic alternative to get the information.”
In an emailed assertion this week, the division mentioned that underneath Sheriff Robert Luna, oversight officers have full entry to the company’s personnel database, together with recordsdata marked non-public.
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At that time, McDonnell was not sheriff; Villanueva had been sworn into workplace two days earlier. Within the weeks earlier than he took the helm of the Sheriff’s Division, some officers — together with Huntsman — had begun to fret the brand new sheriff would destroy or alter data.
That concern was exacerbated when Villanueva’s incoming chief of employees requested that Chief Alicia Ault — who oversaw the division’s skilled requirements division — reinstate a fired deputy and alter his disciplinary document. Ault mentioned in a deposition in a civil case that she was informed he needed it performed earlier than Villanueva took workplace so it might seem to have been performed by McDonnell’s administration.
Ault give up over what she described on the time as a “extremely unethical” demand.
“Our motive for getting these recordsdata was, partly, to make sure the Sheriff’s Dept. complied with the regulation,” Huntsman informed The Instances this month. “We had been involved that there may be an try to change authorities data, and we needed to acquire a duplicate in order that we might have the ability to present proof to anyone later.”
In 2018, division officers created a secret audit software that may permit them to trace who accessed personnel recordsdata — together with exterior oversight officers.
Over the following 11 months, the sheriff’s report says, that auditing software confirmed that Workplace of Inspector Normal officers downloaded an “extraordinary quantity” of things — 1,500 — from the division’s database of personnel recordsdata. Huntsman mentioned that quantity was not shocking “as a result of that was exactly our job.”
Based on the report, Shasty accessed the recordsdata of 9 present or former sheriff’s officers on Nov. 28, 2018. Within the following days, she reviewed extra recordsdata, and on Dec. 1, she downloaded dozens of instances involving folks Villanueva was planning to advertise or rehire. Shasty downloaded or accessed a few of those self same personnel recordsdata once more on Jan. 2.
This engendered suspicion amongst Sheriff’s Division investigators, in accordance with their report.
There was “no affordable or respectable rationalization” for Shasty to question sure recordsdata as a result of she had seemed them up a month earlier, the report mentioned. In one other occasion, the report states that not one of the folks whose recordsdata Shasty accessed was underneath “any sort of investigation” on the time, making it a violation of the memorandum of settlement to entry them, in addition to a violation of California authorities code and “seemingly” California bar ethics guidelines.
Shasty declined to remark.
The report doesn’t current any clear allegations that the data Shasty accessed had been misused or leaked.
Teran, in the meantime, downloaded dozens of case recordsdata on no less than three separate events, together with on June 5, 2018, the day of the first election, and Dec. 2, 2018, her final day working for the Sheriff’s Division, in accordance with the report.
The report equates the file downloads to the theft of “commerce secrets and techniques,” arguing that the “financial worth” to information reporters who obtained them could be “incalculable.”
“If disclosed or revealed opposite to regulation, for a non-legitimate goal, (to promote newspapers or achieve viewers to an internet site or broadcast) these recordsdata and the knowledge they include might trigger irreparable hurt, to not solely the topic whose personnel file was breached however victims, witnesses, informants, and different stakeholders within the felony justice system,” the report says.
The report presents no proof that any of the downloads was shared with the media or improperly made public.
Despite the fact that California Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta finally rejected the case the Sheriff’s Division despatched him, this 12 months he charged Teran in a separate case that includes comparable allegations. His workplace says the 2 are unrelated.
Within the new case, Bonta has alleged that after Teran left the Sheriff’s Division and started working for the L.A. County district lawyer’s workplace, she illegally used confidential data of about 11 sheriff’s deputies when she flagged their names for inclusion in a database of drawback officers.
Teran’s lawyer, James Spertus, has mentioned that his consumer did nothing improper and that the data in query had been already public in present courtroom filings.
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After Villanueva took workplace, his transition group began reviewing personnel data to determine which deputies to rehire and seen the “abnormalities” — resulting in the investigation and allegations that Teran had downloaded confidential personnel data.
Sheriff’s Division investigators tried to determine whether or not any had been leaked to the media by going by means of greater than 2,500 emails. The report says they discovered not one of the emails contained unlawfully obtained information.
In April 2019, the division introduced its findings to the FBI and the state lawyer basic’s workplace. Federal and state officers concluded no crimes had been dedicated and informed sheriff’s officers they wouldn’t tackle the investigation.
Nonetheless, Villanueva’s investigators pressed forward. By August, the inner felony investigators dealing with the case had terminated their inquiry and the matter was turned over to veteran division murder investigator Lillienfeld — who had been rehired out of retirement and have become a key member of a brand new public corruption unit that critics mentioned focused the sheriff’s political enemies.
However Lillienfeld had a fraught historical past with the division. In 2018, after he had retired and begun working for the district lawyer’s workplace, sheriff’s officers banned him from all county lockups as a result of he was caught on digicam posing as a deputy and sneaking into Males’s Central Jail. The Instances first reported the story in October 2019, as Lillienfeld’s investigation started ramping up. This week, he didn’t reply to a request for remark from The Instances.
Retired L.A. County sheriff’s murder Det. Mark Lillienfeld enters Males’s Central Jail in a deputy’s uniform and leaves a plastic bag and cup within the inmate chapel.
In some unspecified time in the future the investigation expanded past its preliminary line of inquiry into Teran’s downloads and started probing different questions — each concerning the “Personal to IAB” recordsdata and a few checklist of drawback deputies leaked to a Los Angeles Instances reporter.
In the meantime, Villanueva mentioned publicly that he had recused himself from the matter and had put Undersheriff Tim Murakami answerable for the case. In August 2019, Murakami introduced the investigation in a letter to the Board of Supervisors.
Regardless of the FBI’s prior lack of curiosity within the case, Lillienfeld and his lieutenant met for 2 hours in October 2019 with FBI officers and then-federal prosecutor Brandon Fox to press their case in opposition to Teran, Huntsman and others.
After listening to the allegations, Fox informed investigators he felt there have been clearly “no violations of federal regulation introduced” and requested the detectives in the event that they needed a declination letter from his workplace, in accordance with a supplemental report within the case file. The sheriff’s investigators declined, saying within the report they weren’t searching for an opinion however as an alternative advising the FBI in case brokers needed to take over the investigation, and making certain there was no battle.
Then in March 2020, attorneys for the county obtained the opinion from Middleton.
He wrote that the notion that the investigation was aimed toward intimidating and obstructing the Workplace of Inspector Normal’s probe into the division “will solely develop stronger if the investigation continues even after the Division has been suggested that there seemingly are not any viable felony costs.”
The next month, Murakami complained to the U.S. Division of Justice concerning the perceived “risk” from Middleton. He mentioned he would shut down the investigation if it was hampering any work the FBI or Division of Justice was doing.
In a response, then-U.S. Atty. Nicola Hanna mentioned Middleton was retired and didn’t converse for his workplace.
“I sadly can not offer you an advisory opinion as as to if any member of your Division is violating obstruction of justice legal guidelines in finishing up the investigation you describe,” Hanna continued.
That October, Lillienfeld and one other lieutenant met with a particular agent in cost on the FBI, in accordance with one other report within the case file. The pair needed to group up or hand off all their supplies to the FBI. The FBI agent declined the provides.
The next 12 months, in November 2021, the division once more despatched the case to Bonta’s workplace, describing it as a “long-term felony inquiry that started in 2017” and had established “ample proof of illegal conduct” together with theft, housebreaking, receiving stolen property and different crimes. Regardless of the earlier disinterest, in early 2022 Bonta’s workplace responded with a brief letter agreeing to evaluation the case.
This 12 months state prosecutors formally declined to file costs, in accordance with a three-sentence letter reviewed by The Instances from Chief Assistant Atty. Gen. Lance Winters to Sheriff Robert Luna.
“Now we have accomplished our evaluation, and we have now declined to file any costs,” Winters wrote.
It’s unclear why it took Bonta’s workplace greater than two years to reject it. In an emailed assertion early Thursday, the state Division of Justice mentioned solely that it did a “thorough investigation” and in the end “discovered inadequate proof to warrant felony costs.”
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It’s extremely uncommon for regulation enforcement officers to overtly focus on ongoing corruption probes, particularly earlier than there are costs filed.
However all through his time period as sheriff, Villanueva trumpeted particulars of the case, regardless that he claimed he’d recused himself.
“Individuals obtained caught with their arms within the cookie jar,” he mentioned in September 2020 on Fb Reside. “It seems I used to be one in all 22 workers, the place their recordsdata had been illegally accessed and downloaded. While you illegally entry them, that’s a misdemeanor crime. While you obtain them, and take away them, then it turns into a felony. This occurred 2,400 occasions.”
He went on to say: “These recordsdata, as they had been downloaded, they began showing within the media. Gee, I’m wondering how.”
The long-running investigation, he mentioned, has “simply led to rather a lot, and so they preserve discovering extra, they preserve investigating extra. And I’m not even a part of that course of, undoubtedly not, I’ve recused myself.”
Lillienfeld left the division after Luna took workplace in late 2022. The division has declined to reply particular questions concerning the probe, noting that the investigation came about underneath a previous administration and officers turned the matter over to the state in 2021.
To Huntsman, it’s been disappointing to see a division that was as soon as so wanting to publicly flaunt the case in opposition to him now so tight-lipped about its conclusion.
“When the AG informed LASD they wouldn’t be prosecuting the inspector basic, LASD stored it a secret,” he mentioned.
In actual fact, Huntsman added, he has by no means formally been knowledgeable by the division or the lawyer basic’s workplace that he’s not a felony suspect.
