EXCLUSIVE: San Mateo Co. sheriff says false info being shared from department, Board of Supervisors
"A lot of this made-up garbage that goes viral and that is very harmful to people," Sheriff Christina Corpus said.
SAN MATEO, Calif. (KGO) -- Anatomy of a lie. The ABC7 News I-Team digs deeper into a report about alleged misconduct in the San Mateo County Sheriff's office, and false information spreading from sources within the Sheriff's Department and Board of Supervisors.
"That's what we're dealing with here," Sheriff Christina Corpus told the I-Team. "A lot of this made-up garbage that goes viral and that is very harmful to people."
TIMELINE: San Mateo County Sheriff Christina Corpus investigation
The temperature in San Mateo County politics couldn't be much higher. Keep in mind, the 40 current and former employees who spoke to the investigator for this audit were allowed to remain anonymous, and did not testify under oath. The sheriff and her chief of staff tell me, they are trying to counter many lies as they bring about much-needed change in the department.
Sheriff Corpus' chief of staff, Victor Aenlle told the I-Team, "We noticed that there was no security at all whatsoever," in the new sheriff's office building, when Corpus took over. Aenlle said they had to install an $800,000 keycard system, metal detectors land bulletproof glass in the front doors.
Victor Aenlle: "And then part of the security for our employees, because we have a lot of employees in there, is that we selected a number of floors to have lockers and put a few rifles in there in case of an emergency. That was the purpose."
Dan Noyes: "Active shooter situation."
Aenlle: "Absolutely right.
Near the offices for the sheriff and her executive staff on the fifth floor, they installed a gun safe to hold three suppressed rifles - or rifles with silencers - each labeled.
"The sergeant came in with a big bag," Aenlle recounted. "He said, 'Here are the three rifles, okay. Put them in the safe.' And he and I both made a combination, the safe close to shut it. That was a temporary passcode. I give it to the assistant sheriff. That was it."
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By the time the 400-page report came out and the Board of Supervisors announced the results, suppressed rifles near the executive offices had become a problem.
Supervisor Noelia Corzo told the meeting on November 13, "He ordered the delivery of suppressed rifles to the sheriff's office last month."
The report listed "Allegation #11 -- Aenlle, Sheriff Corpus and her executive team improperly possess suppressed rifles."
But retired Judge LaDoris Cordell who performed the investigation cleared Sheriff Corpus, her undersheriff and assistant sheriff, but sustained the accusation for Aenlle because he "is not a regular, salaried, full-time peace officer." Cordell did not mention that Aenlle has trained extensively as a reserve deputy, including a "tactical rifle" course, and that he worked for nine years at the sheriff's firing range as an instructor.
Aenlle explained, "And with everything was going on and how I saw people turning and doing pretty shady things in law enforcement and lying - I wanted to make sure that at least I was protected in that."
EXCLUSIVE: San Mateo Co. sheriff's chief of staff answers calls to resign, shares his side of story
After the county executive removed Aenlle as chief of staff, he called Undersheriff Dan Perea, who memorialized the conversation in a memo to the sheriff. Aenlle asked Perea to change the code to the safe and said, "This is how they are going to try to get me."
Noyes: "What did you mean by that?"
Aenlle: "What I meant was that we're going to try to do something with that. Like, blame me for something and maybe something goes missing. Because there's this narrative that was being created, that I was scary, and that's the furthest from the truth."
On November 15, a Friday, the sheriff cleared staff from the fifth floor and ordered the rifles removed from the safe. And that's when the rumors started flying. The I-Team's Dan Noyes received calls from the Board of Supervisors and inside the Sheriff's Department, saying Corpus and her chief of staff were under arrest or about to be arrested - all not true.
The sheriff said, "To have my 85-year-old mother call me crying and asking me if I was OK is not OK. Every one of us has family. And for them to put that nasty rumor out that made it all the way to Sacramento."
RELATED: Several resignations come in fallout of accusations against San Mateo Co. Sheriff Christina Corpus
Reporters were flooding local, state and federal investigators with calls asking about a possible arrest. Corpus tells me she never received a single phone call from investigators about the rifles.
Noyes: "Were you ever contacted by the ATF last week?
Sheriff Christina Corpus: "No, never."
Noyes: "Never. Just totally made up out of whole cloth."
Sheriff Corpus: "Yeah. But that's what we're dealing with here. A lot of this made-up garbage that goes viral and that is very harmful to people and you know, is wrong."
I have more questions about the report. Also, the Board of Supervisors is set to hold a second vote next month on a measure that may eventually allow them to remove the sheriff.
Take a look at more stories by the ABC7 News I-Team.
