Sheriff’s Investigator Tells of Destroying Copies of Tapes

A former member of an intelligence squad that reported directly to Orange County Sheriff Brad Gates has testified that when he left the squad he spirited away copies of “probably more than 20” tapes involving department investigations, then destroyed the tapes after burglars broke into his home last year.

At a deposition Friday in an $11-million damage suit against Gates by former Orange County Register reporter Chuck Cook, Stanley Ray Kinkade, now a sergeant assigned to the sheriff’s economic crimes unit, also testified that Gates had ordered him in 1979 to investigate another reporter’s possible role in a criminal case.

Kinkade would not name the reporter, but attorney Kevin B. McDermott, who represents Cook and was present at the deposition, identified him as former Register reporter Joe Cordero, now a private investigator in Yorba Linda.

The investigation in that criminal case lasted three to four weeks and did not result in criminal charges against the reporter (Cordero), Kinkade said.

The reporter became a subject of the investigation, Kinkade said, because he had written an article quoting from documents that had been reported stolen in an auto burglary. Kinkade said he was not alleging that the reporter stole the documents.

“But they were printed in the paper. So how he got them, I don’t know,” Kinkade said, according to a transcript of the deposition.

Cordero had written a series of articles about Gates’ financial dealings as sheriff. Afterward, a federal grand jury investigated Gates’ financial affairs, but the inquiry ended without any charges being filed against the sheriff.

Cordero said in a telephone interview Monday that he had no quarrel with the sheriff’s investigation.

“It appears that Mr. Gates personally received an inquiry (about) how I obtained certain documentation in conjunction with my publication of a news story (and) that Mr. Gates requested an investigation into what my source for that documentation may have been,” Cordero said. “That investigation substantiated the fact my documentation was legally obtained.”

Cook filed suit in U.S. District Court last year, alleging that Gates used members of his department in an elaborate, 2 1/2-year retaliatory campaign against him because of stories he had written.

The campaign started in 1982, Cook said, after he wrote articles about troubles at the sheriff-coroner’s office and deaths in Orange County Jail. Cook has said that Gates and others in his department used threats and surveillance to try to silence him. Cook is seeking $11 million in damages.

Gates has denied the allegations of the lawsuit.

On Monday, Gates referred calls for comment about Kinkade’s testimony to his attorney, Eric L. Dobberteen, who downplayed its significance.

“Obviously we’re in the early stages of discovery here, and we have a long ways to go in this case,” he said.

Dobberteen added that Kinkade, who testified that he was involved in no investigation concerning Cook, “has nothing to offer with regard to Mr. Cook’s complaint.”

Kinkade testified that he was a member of the sheriff’s Orange County Criminal Activity Section intelligence squad from late 1979 until 1982, when he was transferred to the department’s homicide division. When he left the intelligence squad, Kinkade said, he took with him “probably more than 20” tapes from investigations he conducted as a member of the squad and in an earlier assignment with the department’s internal affairs division.

Would Not Discuss Contents

Kinkade would not elaborate on the contents of the tapes.

But in a separate lawsuit last year, it was disclosed that Gates’ intelligence squad had secretly taped a classroom lecture by Rancho Santiago College instructor George Wright, a one-time candidate for sheriff against Gates. The Wright tape actually came from Kinkade, McDermott said.

The tape surfaced in a lawsuit by Orange County Municipal Judge Bobby D. Youngblood against Gates. Youngblood, now an attorney in private practice, had alleged harassment and improper surveillance tactics. The lawsuit was settled out of court shortly after the Wright tape became public.

About the time that the Wright tape became public, Kinkade’s home in Santa Ana was burglarized, and he decided to destroy all his remaining tapes, he testified. His home was the site of one more burglary and three attempted break-ins in ensuing months, he said.

Although Kinkade would not speculate on the motive for the burglaries, McDermott suggested that someone was trying to get the tapes. McDermott said he had information that Kinkade took the tapes when he left the intelligence unit after other squad members threatened reprisal for his outspoken opposition to some of their activities.

“It’s our belief that these tapes were maintained for the purpose of providing some sort of insurance,” McDermott said during the deposition.