Paul Tanaka is found guilty of corruption charges

Paul Tanaka, the former second-in-command of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, conspired and obstructed justice, a federal jury decided Wednesday, finding him guilty of two felonies.

U.S. Attoey Eileen Decker and David Bowdich, the assistant director in charge of the FBI’s field office in L.A., flanked by assistant U.S. attoeys and FBI special agents who worked on the case, spoke to reporters outside the courthouse following the verdict.

“Today another jury has spoken,” Decker said. “They’ve spoken loudly, they’ve spoken swiftly and they have sent a very clear message that corruption within law enforcement is something that will not be tolerated, particularly when it comes from the very top of those organizations.”

The trial in a downtown Los Angeles federal courtroom lasted 10 days.

Jurors deliberated for about two hours, begiing Tuesday afteoon.

Tanaka, 57, appeared emotionless as the verdict was read. He declined comment to reporters afterward.

Tanaka joins nine other Sheriff’s Department officials, including former Sheriff Lee Baca, who have pleaded guilty or been convicted in the corruption scheme.

Tanaka, who testified in his own defense, said he did not recall many of the events surrounding the case. His attoeys argued that Tanaka was taking what he thought were lawful orders from Baca and pointed to Baca as the mastermind.

An alteate juror said in an interview Wednesday that he did not believe Tanaka couldn’t recall the events surrounding the case.

“I don’t know how that is possible,” Al Shaheen said. “He did not come across as credible.”

Shaheen said the defense team did not make nearly as convincing a case as the prosecution.

Tanaka is the highest-ranking executive to be tried. He was indicted in May along with a former captain, who pleaded guilty to lying on the witness stand.

Baca pleaded guilty in February to lying to federal investigators during an interview. He will be sentenced next month.

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Prosecutors said Tanaka led a group of co-conspirators who schemed to thwart a federal investigation into civil rights violations in county jails. Tanaka and the others leaed of the investigation once they discovered a cell phone smuggled into the Men’s Central Jail was used to call the FBI’s civil rights division office. Prosecutors said deputies hid an inmate from the FBI, tampered with witnesses by telling deputies not to cooperate with federal investigators and threatened to arrest an FBI special agent.

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• PHOTO GALLERY: Former L.A. County Undersheriff Paul Tanaka found guilty on corruption charges

Jerome Haig, one of Tanaka’s attoeys, told reporters they were disappointed with the verdict, but not angry.

“When we first took this case we thought that the charges did not merit even a filing,” Haig said. “We continue to think that Mr. Tanaka is iocent.”

“Certainly, Leroy Baca was a glaring presence, but not a prescence inside the courtroom and we would have been happy to have had him come in and testify and I think the jury would have liked to have heard him as well,” Haig said.

The judge denied the defense’s request to compel Baca to testify and grant him immunity. The defense also tried to admit some of Baca’s statements to investigators into evidence, a request the judge also denied.

Tanaka’s family and friends attended the trial each day. His wife quietly wept in the courtroom after the verdict was read.

Assistant U.S. Attoey Brandon Fox called two dozen witnesses to testify against Tanaka, many were former Sheriff’s Department employees. He showed the jury dozens of emails, Sheriff’s Department memos, summaries of phone records and played audio and video recordings, including surveillance footage of two sergeants confronting and threatening an FBI special agent at her home.

Fox said the scheme was dubbed “Operation Pandora’s Box” because if the allegations of deputy abuse and corruption were revealed through the investigation, Pandora’s Box would be opened and the “evils” that were going on inside the jail would be revealed.

•RELATED STORY: Paul Tanaka admits he has tattoo associated with violent deputy gang

Several retired Sheriff’s Department officials testified that they waed Tanaka years ago about problems with deputies using excessive force inside the jails. Some testified that they were soon transferred from their positions once they crossed Tanaka, who was depicted by some witnesses as irate and making disparaging remarks about the FBI.

Tanaka’s attoey H. Dean Steward told the jury during closing arguments that some prosecution witnesses were “Caucasians” who “seemed angry” and that they were jealous of Tanaka’s rise through the ranks.

Fox said the case had nothing to do with race.

Tanaka took the stand for nearly two days in his own defense.

Under questioning from his attoey, he denied his involvement and said he held himself and the deputies he supervised to a high code of conduct.

During the prosecution’s cross-examination, Tanaka admitted he has a tattoo associated with a deputy gang that a federal judge called a “neo-nazi, white supremacist gang.”

Tanaka said the tattoo of a Viking merely represented the mascot of the Lynwood patrol station where he worked when deputies played intramural sports.

One witness, former Deputy Mickey Manzo, was convicted as a co-conspirator in the case. Manzo said that Baca gave orders and said that deputies were instructed that “Everything that came out of the investigation would be run through Mr. Tanaka.”

Fox played jurors a recording of a phone call that an FBI supervisor made to one of the sergeants who approached FBI Special Agent Leah Marx outside her home.

The supervisor asked what the charges were against Marx.

“You’re going to have to speak to the undersheriff and that’s Paul Tanaka,” Sgt. Maricela Long told Marx’s supervisor, according to the audio recording of a phone call.

U.S. District Court Judge Percy Anderson has overseen all of the trials of deputies convicted in the corruption scheme. In 2014, Anderson sentenced two lieutenants, two sergeants and three deputies to federal prison terms ranging from 18 months to three-and-a-half years. The defendants have appealed their sentences.

Tanaka, who has been the mayor of Gardena since 2005, ran for sheriff in 2014. Sheriff Jim McDoell, then Long Beach police chief, handily defeated Tanaka, who all but abandoned his campaign.

Anderson will determine Tanaka’s sentence at a June 20 hearing. The maximum penalty for both conspiracy and obstruction of justice convictions is 15 years in federal prison.

Tanaka’s attoey said they plan to appeal.