This story was originally published in Friday’s print edition of the Daily Post. If you want to be the first to get all of the local news, pick up the Post every morning at 1,000 locations in the Mid-Peninsula.
BY ADRIANA HERNANDEZ
Daily Post Staff Writer
San Mateo County Sheriff Christina Corpus will have to testify before a civil grand jury that is investigating her, a judge ruled Thursday (June 12).
She’s expected to take the stand either Monday or Tuesday (June 16 or 17).
San Mateo County Superior Court Judge Nicole Healy, at a hearing Thursday that lasted 10 minutes, rejected a request from Corpus’s to not testify before a civil grand jury.
Corpus was subpoenaed on May 28 to testify on Tuesday. But her attorneys filed a motion seeking to stop her testimony, claiming District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe’s office had a conflict of interest. They claimed it was a conflict that he is investigating Corpus on criminal charges while also presenting a case to the civil grand jury.
Wagstaffe and Corpus’ attorney, Mariah Cooks, spoke on May 27 after she read the Post’s article on how he is investigating Corpus, Cooks said in a statement submitted to the court. Wagstaffe said in that article his office was looking into the allegations against Corpus and her former chief of staff, Victor Aenlle, contained in a 400-page report by retired Judge LaDoris Cordell.
Corpus’ attorneys say the DA’s office should also be recused because his office assigns investigators who were former members of the sheriff deputy’s union to investigate matters related to Carlos Tapia, the union president who was arrested on Corpus’ orders for alleged time card fraud on the day the Cordell report came out.
Corpus’ attorneys also claim Wagstaffe has made statements “prejudging” the Tapia case when he said the union president shouldn’t have been arrested and jailed.
Wagstaffe is friends with County Executive Mike Callagy and his attorney Jim Hartnett. Wagstaffe and Hartnett serve on the 100 Club nonprofit board, and Hartnett was once Wagstaffe’s campaign manager, according to Corpus’ attorneys.
The response from Deputy District Attorney Joshua Martin was filed under seal, meaning it will not be available to the public. Wagstaffe said the response must remain under seal because issues related to a civil grand jury are confidential by law.
Deputy District Attorney David Stein told Corpus’ attorneys he is expecting her to testify on Monday or Tuesday, June 16 or 17, Cooks said in her testimony.
Healy decided that Corpus’s request was premature. The next hearing for her request will be Aug. 13, which may be after the civil grand jury has completed its work.
It’s 0-2 for Corpus
This is the second request by Corpus for a temporary restraining order that was denied this week.
On Monday, Healy denied Corpus’ request for a TRO to stop the county supervisors from starting a process to fire her.
The county supervisors’ legal team had 38 minutes notice of that hearing. County Attorney John Nibbelin said at the Tuesday’s county board of supervisors meeting that the opposing legal team typically receives 24-hour notice.
Attorneys from Keker Van Nest & Peters, which represents the county, had to appear in court via Zoom since they didn’t have time to travel to Healy’s San Mateo courtroom from their offices in San Francisco. Healy denied Corpus’s request, allowing for the removal proceeding to stay on track, Nibbelin said. Healy said the request was premature before the termination proceeding was complete.
Corpus is accused of corruption, including conflicts of interest, nepotism, retaliation, intimidation and making racial and homophobic slurs. She ordered the arrest of the deputies union president, who had been critical of her, on charges the DA later threw out. She fired her assistant sheriff after he spoke to a retired judge who was investigating corruption in the sheriff’s office.
Corpus has denied the allegations and said she is facing discrimination from the county government’s “Good Old Boys” network because she is the county’s first Latina sheriff.
Nonetheless, San Mateo County voters on March 4 approved Measure A, which changed the county charter to give the Board of Supervisors the ability to fire the sheriff. The supervisors are now moving forward in the process to remove the sheriff.
However, the civil grand jury also has the ability under California law to start the process of removing an elected office holder such as a sheriff. The jury, which meets in secret, must vote to bring an “accusation” against the office holder. Then the office holder will go on trial. The trial will determine whether the official can be removed from office.
It’s going to be a long weekend for Sheriff Christy trying to get all the lies straight for her grand jury appearance. I’m sure the doctor is helping her out with all his experience testifying in court.
She’s going to take the Fifth before the grand jury. It won’t help her. It will make her look worse before the grand jurors.
Anyone else remember corpus storming into the board of supervisors chambers and demanding “to be heard” and promised to give a statement “in a few days”? Now she is fighting to not have to testify. Literally nothing she has said is true.
It is also ironic she points to the 100 club as the tie between Wagstaffe and Harnett. Every sheriff, including corpus sat on that board until she resigned via text message making her the only sheriff in the history of San Mateo county not to sit on the 100 club board since it was founded. It checks out because charity work requires selfless work where you don’t personally benefit.
Once again, Christina is playing a game of tic-tac-toe while all of the grownups are playing chess. Oh, to be a fly on the wall. It should be a new experience for her, testifying Under oath, as she had very little if any experience in doing so as a deputy. Undoubtedly she will take the 5th for most, if not all of the questions. The only thing this will do is demonstrate her consciousness of guilt. Telling the truth under penalty of perjury will be a whole new concept for her as the truth does not seem to be a virtue she is not familiar with. Questioning the integrity of SteveWagstaffe is laughable. I have known and worked with him countless times over the years. The man is one of the hardest working people I have EVER known and is WAY beyond reproach. Convening a grand jury and presenting the case to them is part of his job and he WILL perform his job with absolute perfection as he always does. Christina is lashing out in desperation and as typical, letting her emotions dictate her actions. Christina, the clock is ticking and you will soon find yourself out of a job and facing criminal charges and jail time. But wait, that’s not all – because here come the Feds! Remember, there are no conjugal cells or visits in prison! My bet is little Vicky will be flipping on you to get consideration for his own pending cases!
Once again, Christina is playing a game of tic-tac-toe while all of the grownups are playing chess. Oh, to be a fly on the wall. It should be a new experience for her, testifying Under oath, as she had very little if any experience in doing so as a deputy. Undoubtedly she will take the 5th for most, if not all of the questions. The only thing this will do is demonstrate her consciousness of guilt. Telling the truth under penalty of perjury will be a whole new concept for her as the truth does not seem to be a virtue she is not familiar with. Questioning the integrity of SteveWagstaffe is laughable. I have known and worked with him countless times over the years. The man is one of the hardest working people I have EVER known and is WAY beyond reproach. Convening a grand jury and presenting the case to them is part of his job and he WILL perform his job with absolute perfection as he always does. Christina is lashing out in desperation and as typical, letting her emotions dictate her actions. Christina, the clock is ticking and you will soon find yourself out of a job and facing criminal charges and jail time. But wait, that’s not all – because here come the Feds! Remember, there are no conjugal cells or visits in prison! My bet is little Vicky will be flipping on you to get consideration for his own pending cases!
Well Well Well! No where to hide now is there Christina???? You can plead the 5th, which is all you will likely do, but it will destroy you in front of the Grand Jury!!!! You reap what you sow!!! You deserve everything that is happening right now!! NOBODY wants you to remain in power. You have destroyed the office and peoples lives. We can only hope Criminal Charges will be forthcoming! Dr. Vicky cannot help you now!!!
Debating if we should start a go fund me for sheriff corpus. Apparently she is so ill she couldn’t make it in to testify in front of the grand jury today.
Thoughts and prayers Chrissy.
Knock, Knock, Knock
Christy: Who’s there?
DA inspector: Open up, we have an arrest warrant.
Christy: Where are you going Vickie?
I miss Sheriff Earl Whitmore, former neighbor, friend, and a great Sheriff.
San Mateo County residents were still safe until the one party system decided to endorse Corpus who checked all the boxes except one: competence. This is the problem with a County that once was balanced politically, but whose focus was always on the betterment of the citizens.
It’s turned into an insane political circus focusing on who can outdo who to move farther toward the extreme Left.
I never thought that would happen in the County that I was born and raised and worked in my entire professional career. I was 5th Generation and left in 2016 after watching the place start to circle the drain. Most of my friends who owned small businesses and even large corporations bailed too.
How did it get to the point where the focus is on “equity” and not equality and personal achievement?
Tech will be the next to pull out. California and their cities are in great trouble financially. Unfunded pension liabilities are far in excess of $882 Billion, or about $77,000 per household. That number is rising exponentially each year. In 2020, Palo Alto alone had $476Million in unfunded liability. They play smoke and mirrors, but the number is rising a lot each year.
Wake up. Think about what it is you want your government to do! The basics: public safety, public utilities, and what else? Why free give aways to illegal aliens or other able bodied people who refuse to work.
She called in sick to the grand jury! I’m not kidding. Who has ever heard of that happening? I think the DA and judge need to haul her butt into court to testify, sick or not. And if she doesn’t cooperate, throw her in jail. If she gets away with this, the grand jury will never be able to compel testimony from a reluctant witness ever again.
Because of grand jury secrecy, the pseudonymous comment about Sheriff Corpus “calling in sick” cannot be vetted, but, if not made up, would need to be a leak from someone violating either employment confidentiality or Superior Court orders or both. Maybe it’s just me, but the ongoing abuse of The Daily Post’s forum to float unverifiable office gossip seems one of the least likeable aspects of an otherwise meritorious paper.
In any event, I’m sure civil grand juries, having been in operation since (from memory) the 1600s, do have a formal procedure for documenting need to reschedule summoned testimony on account of claimed illness. I doubt that Wagstaffe and the jurors are in a tearing hurry. The wheels of justice grind slowly but exceedingly fine.