College Teacher Had Been Under Surveillance : U.S. Investigates Charge That Gates Lied

The U.S. Justice Department is investigating an allegation that Orange County Sheriff-Coroner Brad Gates and his deputies lied when they declared under oath during a civil rights lawsuit that they were not aware that a Rancho Santiago College instructor had been under surveillance by members of the sheriff’s intelligence unit.

The investigation started after instructor George Wright filed a complaint with the Justice Department that the sheriff and two members of his intelligence unit changed their statements in testimony during a separate civil rights lawsuit filed by former Orange County Register reporter Chuck Cook.

In depositions this month in the Cook case, Gates and former intelligence unit members Tim Simon and Randall Blair recanted their earlier statements in the $10-million civil rights lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court by Wright, former Municipal Judge Bobby D. Youngblood and private investigator Patrick Bland.

In 1985 statements for that suit, Gates, then-Sgt. Blair and then-Lt. Simon said they knew nothing of any investigation involving Wright, a candidate for Gates’ job in 1978.

Wright, Youngblood and Bland had all filed suit alleging a campaign of harassment and illegal surveillance because they were all outspoken critics of Gates.

A federal judge dismissed Wright from the lawsuit in 1966 because Gates and his subordinates had sworn in their statements that Wright was not under investigation.

Last year, a 1981 tape recording of one of Wright’s classroom lectures was turned over to attorneys in the Youngblood suit by a former member of the sheriff’s intelligence unit. A short time later the Youngblood-Bland lawsuit was settled out of court for $375,000.

In their recent depositions, Gates said he wanted to correct his 1985 testimony because he had not been aware that Wright was under surveillance until the tape surfaced last year. Simon and Blair said they simply forgot that Wright had been under surveillance.

Cook’s $11-million suit in U.S. District Court alleges that he was also placed under surveillance and harassed after he wrote stories criticizing the Sheriff’s Department. The suit is pending. Cook is now a reporter for the Arizona Republic.

Upon hearing of the recanted testimony by the Sheriff’s Department officials, Wright said he filed a complaint of perjury and obstruction of justice with the Justice Department’s Office of Public Integrity.

John Russell, a Justice Department spokesman in Washington, said Friday: “We got a referral (from Wright). That’s all I can say about it. It is still a pending matter.”

Wright last year asked for a civil rights investigation by the Justice Department, alleging that the secret taping of his class violated his constitutional rights. But the probe ended last fall without the Justice Department’s finding any wrongdoing by the Sheriff’s Department.

Wright, 46, said Friday that he has been forced to go outside Orange County for help in investigating Gates because local officials will do nothing. After the discovery of the classroom tape, he said he asked the County Grand Jury and the district attorney’s office to look into the sheriff’s surveillance operations, but they referred him to the federal government.

Wright said that he also appeared before the Board of Supervisors last year to ask them to do something but that they turned a deaf ear.

“They looked at me like five lumps of cement, and not one of them said a word,” Wright said. “No elected official in this county has ever challenged the sheriff on any of this. I’m like in the middle of the desert screaming.”

Gates has referred all inquiries on the Cook lawsuit to his attorney, Eric L. Dobberteen of Los Angeles. Dobberteen was unavailable for comment Friday.