Some Evidence of Misconduct by Police Found : Law Enforcement: ‘We let this little group of officers get out of control,’ Chief Burgreen says.

A 10-month investigation into alleged corruption within the San Diego Police Department has uncovered “wholesale irregularities” in the way the narcotics street team dealt with informants in the mid-1980s, including evidence that police officers used them for “casual sex” and allowed them to keep small portions of narcotics used in drug buys.

The probe by the Metropolitan Homicide Task Force found evidence of “pervasive mismanagement, misconduct and unprofessional activity” surrounding the street team, which targeted small-time narcotics dealers and users starting in the early 1980s.

Police Chief Bob Burgreen said Friday that four current officers and one former officer were identified in the investigation as being involved in the alleged misconduct. All of the officers worked in the narcotics street team at the time.

“The remaining officers will be held accountable for their actions and will be subject to appropriate action very soon,” he said.

Because he was assistant chief at the time of the alleged instances of misconduct, Burgreen said he accepts responsibility.

“We let this little group of officers get out of control,” he said. “It wasn’t like we knew they were out of control. But we weren’t doing what we could have done and perhaps should have done to oversee what they were doing.”

Although the department was generally cleared of all corruption allegations and all problems were classified in the report as police misconduct, Burgreen said he and the entire department are “embarrassed. We want a department that is not ever subject to this type of criticism. It should never happen again.”

The task force turned up “substantial credible evidence” that police officers had sex with a female prostitute and informant, the report says.

Sources close to the investigation identified the officers as Sgt. Sal Salvatierra and Officer John Fung, both of whom worked on the street team during that time and have been linked to prostitute Cynthia Maine. Maine disappeared in 1986 shortly after her release from jail.

Neither Fung nor Salvatierra could be reached for comment.

Much of the report focused on activities involving former street team supervisor Dennis Sesma, who joined the squad in 1984. Sesma, then a sergeant, resigned his job in June, 1989 in the midst of an internal affairs investigation. He did not return phone calls Friday.

The task force determined that “a former narcotics officer” started an investigation into the activities of former Channel 10 newsman Michael Tuck with the knowledge of Burgreen, then assistant chief, and former Police Chief Bill Kolender. Sources have identified the officer as Sesma.

Allegations arose in the late 1980s that Kolender and Burgreen had ordered the investigation into alleged drug use by Tuck because of his consistent scrutiny of the department in his television reports.

Although task force investigators determined that neither Kolender nor Burgreen personally asked for the probe of Tuck, Sesma had direct access to both men and City Manager John Lockwood at the time.

“This resulted in the relinquishment of command control and responsibility by superior officers and unquestioned and unchallenged fealty among officers under (Sesma’s) direction,” the report says.

The task force recommended that investigative officers no longer have direct access to top command officers, and that all informants be “adequately documented in and traceable through department records.”

Elsewhere in the report, the task force discounted allegations made over a number of years that members of the San Diego Police Department intentionally interfered in the San Diego County Sheriff’s Department initial investigation of Donna Gentile’s murder. Gentile’s nude and battered body was found in 1985, shortly after she testified against two San Diego police officers.

Former sheriff’s investigator Tom Streed insisted that the department stalled and blocked the investigation. But the task force noted in its report that, “despite some personality and institutional disagreements, the Police Department actually positively assisted the sheriff’s investigation.”

It recommended, however, that an outside agency such as the district attorney’s office or attorney general’s office be brought in if there is conflict between two local agencies.

Allegations that police officers were involved in the 1988 assault on former police Lt. Doyle Wheeler were also determined to be unfounded. Wheeler, who now lives in Washington state, claimed in 1988 that police officers shot him in retaliation for his testimony against fellow officers in the Sagon Penn police murder case.

The most serious allegations, however, rest with Sesma and his involvement with the narcotics street team.

In one instance, reported by The Times this week, two street team members “entered into a prosecutable criminal conspiracy” to blackmail an informant by arresting her for driving under the influence, the report said. Sources identified the pair as Sesma and Fung.

The Times, quoting law enforcement sources, said Fung had drinks with the woman and followed her on the freeway. Sesma and Fung recruited another officer to make the arrest, then offered to cancel the arrest if the woman would agree to get information on drug use among members of the San Diego Chargers.

According to the report, street team members either provided drugs to informants or allowed them to “chip off” portions for themselves during drug buys. Files on informants and pay records “were not properly prepared or maintained” during the mid-1980s, the report said.

Burgreen said it was a mistake to let Sesma do many of his investigations with minimal supervision, but, because much of his work involved highly sensitive cases--such as Tuck and the San Diego Chargers--he and Kolender wanted as few people as possible to know what was happening.

“We will never again have a sergeant reporting right to the chief’s office again,” he said. “The chain of command will assure that our investigations, each of them, are done according to our procedures and that they are audited and controlled. Our informant contacts will be according to our rules and regulations. Had that been done this time, we wouldn’t be embarrassed now.

Overall, Burgreen said, he is pleased that the report says the department is not corrupt.

“Compared to what’s going on elsewhere in the country, I’d call this small-potatoes corruption,” he said. “But it’s corruption that we’re not going to put up with.”