Ex-Patrolmen Guilty of Falsifying Evidence in Drunk-Driving Case

Two former California Highway Patrol officers pleaded guilty Thursday to felony charges that they conspired to obstruct justice by falsifying a drunk-driving case against a Mission Viejo woman, Deputy Dist. Atty. Maury Evans said.

The district attorney’s office identified the former CHP officers as Robert Scott Fitzgerald, 25, and Gary Sterkel, 26, whose sentencing was set for Dec. 13 before Superior Court Judge Francisco P. Briseno.

In a tersely worded statement, the district attorney’s office said that the guilty pleas followed an investigation into allegations that one of the former officers had filed a “false police report” in connection with the arrest of Kimberly Ann O’Hara during the early morning hours of April 19.

Had Left a Bar

O’Hara, who celebrates her 23rd birthday today, said that on April 19 she had left a bar in San Clemente and was driving north on the Interstate 5.

“I had had the stomach flu all week and had been sick and I pulled over once,” she said Thursday night. She continued driving, but had to stop again about 20 minutes later and pulled over a second time.

Two officers “came up behind me. They approached my car and asked if everything was OK, if I was OK. I explained to them what happened and they asked if I’d been drinking. I said, yes, I had, and I had been sick all week.”

After she and the officers talked for a while, she said, one of them told her: “Obviously, you have enough sense to pull over, so you can’t be that intoxicated.”

The officers told her they would take her home, she said.

But at that point, she said, Officers Sterkel and Fitzgerald pulled up.

“Officer Fitzgerald had asked the first two officers what happened, turned around and looked at me and told me to get in front of my car for a field sobriety test,” she said.

“He made me touch my nose and walk a line, and then he turned me around and handcuffed me and walked me back to the squad car.”

O’Hara, who said she had “taken off the bottom portion of my outfit and I just had on a long jacket,” was taken to the Orange County Jail by Fitzgerald and Sterkel, she said.

The next day, she said, “I discussed it with my family and hired a lawyer.”

In court, she said, “Officers Fitzgerald and Sterkel said they had followed me on the freeway and had seen me driving and swerving all over.”

A law enforcement official who declined to be identified said Fitzgerald had prepared a police report declaring that he was the officer who had seen O’Hara weaving on the highway, when he had not. Both Fitzgerald and Sterkel later testified in court that they had seen her weaving.

All Charges Dismissed

O’Hara said one of the officers who had first been on the scene was subpoenaed and subsequently told the district attorney’s office that he and his partner were the ones who had first stopped her.

All charges against her were dismissed in August, she said.

According to the district attorney’s statement, the investigation revealed that the police report “in fact was false, and that the two former officers had attempted to cover this up during testimony” before South Orange County Municipal Judge Richard Hamilton.

According to the criminal complaint filed in Superior Court against the two former officers, both were accused of testifying “in such a manner as to deliberately mislead Judge Hamilton into believing” that they had “personally observed Kim Ann O’Hara driving a moving motor vehicle. . . .”

Fitzgerald and Sterkel pleaded guilty Thursday, the same day the charges were filed against them.

The same law enforcement official who declined to be identified said no motive was ever established other than “stupidity.” He said the incident led to the removal of Fitzgerald and Sterkel from the force.