LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Lake County's sheriff has filed a suit against the district attorney in an effort to block disclosure of a finding regarding allegations that he lied about a 2008 shooting incident.
On Friday, District Attorney Don Anderson was served with notification that Sheriff Frank Rivero had filed an application for a restraining order and injunction, and also was seeking a writ of mandate regarding findings in Anderson's investigation of the noninjury shooting.
Rivero, while working as a deputy sheriff in February 2008, shot at a man holding a can of pepper spray. It's alleged that he lied to investigators about what he actually saw the man holding in his hand.
Anderson conducted the inquiry under the terms of Brady v. Maryland, a 1963 U.S. Supreme Court case that requires the government to disclose to defendants in criminal cases any information that could potentially clear them, including information about the credibility of law enforcement officers involved in their cases.
“I knew it was coming,” Anderson said of Rivero's legal action.
He said the attempt is being made by Rivero's attorney to keep the Friday filing under seal so that the documents can't be released publicly.
Anderson said the injunction is seeking to stop him from disclosing anything about Rivero's Brady finding either publicly or to criminal defendants.
That, in turn, either could cause Anderson to violate his prosecutorial duties – which could see him sanctioned – force him to drop criminal cases or violate court orders.
Last week, Anderson had sent his finding to Rivero's attorney, with whom he had a “gentleman's agreement” to not disclose the findings publicly for 10 days. That embargo should have run out on Friday, the day Anderson was served.
However, the suit is a day too late in one particular case.
On Thursday, a judge ordered a document related to Rivero's Brady matter to be made available to three Hells Angels members to use in their defense against charges based on a June 2011 fight with a rival Vagos gang member, as Lake County News reported.
While Anderson's office has indicated that Rivero won't be called as a material witness at trial, scheduled for May, retired Lake County Superior Court Judge David Herrick ruled that the information was to be made available to the defense but kept confidential until trial.
The hearing on the restraining order will be held at 3:30 p.m. Monday, March 4, before a visiting judge, Anderson said.
Last year Rivero sued the Lake County Board of Supervisors, which was forced by a visiting judge to provide Rivero with outside counsel on the Brady matter due to a conflict of interest with the County Counsel's Office, which nevertheless represented Rivero at the Hells Angels case motion hearings this week.
On Feb. 19, the same day that Anderson released his finding to Rivero's attorney, the board voted 3-2 to amend a contract with the Jones and Mayer law firm of Fullerton to raise the amount of the counsel contract from $6,500 to $8,500.
A closed session discussion regarding Rivero's lawsuit against the Board of Supervisors and a “significant exposure of litigation” related to it is on next Tuesday's Board of Supervisors agenda.
Email Elizabeth Larson at
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