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Charges dropped against ex-San Jose Mayor Gonzales, aide GuerraBy Rodney Foo and Barry Witt Mercury News Article Launched: 06/12/2007 02:35:32 PM PDT All charges against former San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales and his aide Joe Guerra were dropped by a Santa Clara County District Court judge. The charges, including bribery, stemmed from a deal with trash hauler NorCal Waste Systems Inc. Charges against Norcal were also thrown out. Judge John Herlihy signed an order Monday dismissing the charges. In the order, Herlihy cited errors given to the grand jury as grounds for throwing out the entire indictment against Gonzales and...

Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge James C. Emerson today ordered the release of more than 2,500 pages of transcribed testimony given over several months this year to the grand jury that indicted San Jose's mayor on six criminal felony counts. Fifty-five pages of the transcripts were sealed, including the testimony of Mayor Ron Gonzales and his chief aide, Joe Guerra. The release of the transcripts represents the latest chapter in a yearlong scandal that has roiled San Jose City Hall during a mayoral election year. The issue has generated two major investigations, an unprecedented censure of the mayor by...

A Santa Clara County superior court judge today ordered the unsealing of the vast majority of the transcript from the secret grand jury proceeding used to indict San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales and his chief budget aide on corruption charges. About 55 pages of the 2,500-page transcript will remain sealed because releasing them "would jeopardize the defendants' right to a fair trial," Santa Clara County Judge James Emerson ruled. "Such transcripts often contain criminal records, alleged confessions and other matter which is later ruled out as evidence at trial," Emerson wrote, citing language from a 1968 appellate court ruling. "That...

As much as 17 percent of the grand jury testimony that led to the criminal indictment of Mayor Ron Gonzales, his top aide and Norcal Waste Systems should remain under seal because it could prejudice potential jurors or be inadmissible at trial, lawyers for the defendants say. Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge James Emerson was set to hear the lawyers' request to keep portions of the testimony secret Thursday. While lawyers for Gonzales and his aide, Joe Guerra, submitted an identical list of transcript sections they want sealed that amounts to about seven full pages, Norcal's attorneys asked that...

SAN JOSE Mayor Ron Gonzales pleaded not guilty Wednesday to public corruption charges for his part in an alleged garbage-related scheme. Santa Clara Superior Court Judge James Emerson set a trial date of May 14, 2007, nearly five months after Gonzales is scheduled to leave office. Attorneys on both sides said they'd need at least nine months to pore over more than 100,000 pages of documents and conduct interviews related to the case. Prosecutors say Gonzales pressured Norcal Waste Systems Inc. into using Teamsters, instead of lower-paid union workers, at a recycling plant, and then secretly agreed to help the...

The Teamsters union on Thursday defended the $11 million garbage contract that led to the indictment of Mayor Ron Gonzales. Gonzales is accused of pressuring Norcal Waste Systems Inc., into using the Teamsters - instead of a lower-paid union - at a recycling plant. Prosecutors allege he then secretly agreed to help the trash contractor recoup the extra labor expenses at a taxpayer expense. Union officials said at a news conference on Thursday that there was never a "secret" deal. "How can I be in a secret deal when I went and testified before the entire city council and we...

The City Council asked Mayor Ron Gonzales to resign on Wednesday in the wake of his indictment over a secretly negotiated garbage contract. Gonzales voted against the proposal, which passed 8-3, and said he has no plans of quitting. Gonzales was booed by a heckler at one point when he vowed to stay in office. The council is now mulling ways to strip Gonzales of his power. Possible actions, according to City Attorney Richard Doyle, include cutting Gonzales' office staff's budget, revoking his city-issued credit card, withholding his travel funds, and reducing the mayor's $105,000 salary to as low as...

San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales faced a judge and a packed courtroom for the first time Monday, but he saved his first public defense against felony bribery and fraud charges in a garbage contract scandal for a friendlier environment: a press conference surrounded by supporters at City Hall. The embattled mayor postponed entering a plea in a brief arraignment before Santa Clara County Judge Rene Navarro, and made a hasty exit into the glare of dozens of cameras, holding hands with his wife. About an hour later, he was back at City Hall, vowing to remain in office and declaring...

The embattled but defiant mayor of San Jose was arraigned Monday on public corruption charges stemming from a secretly negotiated garbage contract deal. Mayor Ron Gonzales, 55, did not enter a plea to six felony counts in the indictment unsealed last week, including conspiracy, bribery, misappropriating public funds and falsifying records. If convicted, he could face up to eight years in prison. Gonzales, who is in his final year as mayor of the nation's 10th largest city, made an initial appearance in Santa Clara County Superior Court before Judge Rene Navarro. He did not speak, standing next to his attorneys...

A majority of San Jose City Council members now say Mayor Ron Gonzales should resign his post and the council has scheduled a meeting for next week to discuss removing him from office or stripping him of power. And Councilman Chuck Reed this morning asked the council to rescind the $11.25 million contract amendment to Norcal Waste Systems that is at the root of the city's garbage scandal. Meanwhile the political fallout from Thursday's arrest of Gonzales and his budget aide, Joe Guerra, continued. Councilwoman Nancy Pyle joined five council colleagues in calling for Gonzales to step down. ``I will...

San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales and his top budget aide Joe Guerra were arrested and released by the Santa Clara County Sheriff's department this morning, according to Deputy Sheriff Serg Palanov. Although the grounds for arrest were not immediately known, it came amid a civil grand jury investigation related to the two men's behind-the-scenes actions from 2000 to 2005 to help Norcal Waste Systems get an $11.25 million contract amendment after it underbid the labor component of its winning bid to collect trash for 155,000 San Jose residents. Allen Ruby, a lawyer for Gonzales, did not immediately return a call...

Mayor Ron Gonzales was indicted by a county grand jury Thursday on six counts, his office said, but the allegations were not immediately clear. Prosecutors have said they were investigating whether Gonzales committed any crime for secretly negotiating a trash hauling contract with Norcal Waste Systems that cost taxpayers an additional $11.25 million in labor costs. Neither authorities nor Gonzales could immediately be reached for comment, but the mayor's office said he and aide Joe Guerra posted bail Thursday morning. Guerra's lawyer, Alan Lagod, hadn't seen an indictment, but said his client and the mayor "self-surrendered at the sheriff's department...

San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales and his top budget aide Joe Guerra were arrested and released by the Santa Clara County Sheriff's department this morning, according to Deputy Sheriff Serg Palanov. Although the grounds for arrest were not immediately known, it came amid a civil grand jury investigation related to the two men's behind-the-scenes actions from 2000 to 2005 to help Norcal Waste Systems get an $11.25 million contract amendment after it underbid the labor component of its winning bid to collect trash for 155,000 San Jose residents.

Any day now, San Jose citizens are expected to learn whether a civil grand jury or the county's top prosecutor believe any crime was committed when Mayor Ron Gonzales helped trash hauler Norcal Waste Systems secure an $11.25 million contract amendment in December 2004. --snip-- Although the grand jury operates in secrecy, it is widely understood that the group has been investigating whether Gonzales or others received any improper payments or campaign contributions, or committed other crimes in helping Norcal get the contract amendment to pay for unanticipated labor costs. Some of the subpoenas, for instance, included requests for any...

The Santa Clara County civil grand jury and district attorney are investigating whether San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales received any personal or political payments for helping Norcal Waste Systems secure an $11.25 million amendment to a city garbage contract, according to a subpoena obtained by the Mercury News. District Attorney George Kennedy issued the subpoenas earlier this month to companies at the center of the controversy -- Norcal and its recycling subcontractor California Waste Solutions. Prosecutors requested documents that would show any income or political contributions Gonzales or his campaigns may have received. Two earlier investigations into the mayor's secret...

San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales has taken 40 political and business trips in North America during the past four years, and every time he goes, San Jose taxpayers pick up an unusual cost: They pay for a city cop to accompany him. In a few cases, there are two. No other San Jose mayor has received such protection, a post-Sept. 11 precaution that Phoenix, San Antonio and Dallas -- all bigger than San Jose -- don't provide their mayors. The officers often leave a day in advance of Gonzales to set up logistics and have run up $60,000 in travel...

Even before the city manager abruptly announced this week he'll be stepping down, San Jose faced looming political battles and financial challenges. Now, city and community leaders worry that the council will be unable to resolve critical issues in the coming year -- from passing a budget to bringing BART to the city, to building a new ballpark. ``I don't think we can underestimate the difficulty that our government is facing,'' Councilman Ken Yeager said Wednesday. City Manager Del Borgsdorf announced his impending departure a week after the council censured Mayor Ron Gonzales for his role in a secret trash-hauling...

After four hours of impassioned debate, the San Jose City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to impose its most severe punishment on Mayor Ron Gonzales for misleading the council over a contract with Norcal Waste Systems. The council voted 10-0 to censure Gonzales, who repeatedly apologized and said he would spend the final year of his term "earning back the city's trust." The city also voted 9-2 to drop an independent investigation into the affair. The three-month, $100,000 independent probe essentially backed up a Santa Clara County grand jury report from June that said Gonzales cut a deal with Norcal that...

San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales said he was trying to be a ``get-it-done kind of mayor'' when he failed to tell his colleagues on the City Council that there was a labor problem with a Norcal Waste Systems contract that ended up costing the city an extra $11.25 million. Gonzales made his comments today, his first attempt to explain his motives in the controversial Norcal matter, before the city council took up the issue of whether to level the city's first-ever censure of a mayor. ``I've always tried to carry myself as a get-it-done kind of mayor,'' said Gonzales in...

Despite increasing criticism and the threat of a City Council censure because of his alleged role in the Norcal Waste Systems scandal, San Jose Mayor Ron Gonzales does not plan to resign, his spokesman said Thursday. "He plans to finish out his term as scheduled," spokesman David Vossbrink said. Gonzales, whose term expires at the end of 2006, was at the National League of Cities conference in North Carolina and will not be available to the media until Saturday. Pressure on the mayor -- including a call by City Councilman Dave Cortese for his resignation -- intensified this week when...