The sudden departure of prosecutor Jeff Kerr with the Maricopa County Attorney's Office last summer is leaving more questions than answers.
Kerr is currently serving as director of judicial clerkships at the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law. Before that, he prosecuted felony cases, many of them cases involving misconduct with weapons due to his extensive knowledge about guns.
Records show Kerr always wanted to be a cop. In his teens, he was a Mesa Police Explorer.
In 2010, he was hired as one of 300 deputy county attorneys on staff at the Maricopa County Attorney's Office. He had come from the Pima County Attorney's Office, where he was also a prosecutor.
In Maricopa County, Kerr was assigned to work with the Mesa Police Department. He worked with police to identify high-crime areas, then prosecute alleged criminals arrested there.
High Enforcement/Community Prosecution Project in Mesa
According to Kerr's personnel file, he spent many hours in this specialized assignment, often working weekends and spending extra time with Mesa police officers.
In his 2013, performance review, his supervisor at the MCAO wrote he devoted many hours of his "personal time" to assist the Mesa Police Department and therefore, the County Attorney's Office.
County Attorney Bill Montgomery said Kerr was working directly with a subsection of the Mesa Police Department in a specific geographic area. They were trying to see if they could get better results and have a greater impact on crime by having a consistent relationship between the prosecutor and law enforcement in conjunction with community leaders.
When asked if Kerr was too close, Montgomery characterized Kerr's relationship as part of the assignment and said the results were very positive.
MCAO spokesman Jerry Cobb said it was no secret Kerr had friends who were police officers working directly with him on this project.
Legal expert reviews relationship
Michael V. Black has been a criminal defense attorney in Phoenix since 1984. He's a board-certified criminal law specialist and former prosecutor. Black reviewed public records concerning the MCAO's internal investigation of Kerr, as well as Mesa police records dating back to Kerr's service as a Mesa Police Explorer. He said Kerr's relationship with Mesa PD was not unethical or illegal, but characterized it this way: "I think that it was at a minimum inappropriate."
Black went on to say, "You can't place yourself, your personal life, in with your professional. There has to be a division."
Black did say the situation was "really troubling," from his perspective.
When you have a prosecutor insinuating himself into the police activity, there's just too much room for some monkey business to occur," he said. "We're all human beings and you know that's when people cut corners and actually get in real trouble and that's one of the reasons cases fall apart."
He says whether Kerr stepped over the line or not in his professional capacity is not entirely clear. He says it's not unusual for prosecutors to have police officers as friends, but therein lies a potential problem with a prosecutor getting intimately involved in cases, because they can make themselves a witness to what's going on.
Black says if a prosecutor is with the police and an event occurs, the prosecutor may become a witness and have to withdraw from a case he should have prosecuted.
Under internal investigation
On Feb. 25 and 26, 2014, 12 News aired a series of reports that showcased the misconduct of more than a dozen Mesa police officers who were part of the Dobson Bike Patrol. The officers posed for photos in which they were made up as members of various races, portraying drug dealers, gang members, drug cartel members, Mexican banditos and a Nazi soldier.
They papered the walls of the Dobson Bike Patrol satellite office on Southern Avenue in Mesa with Polaroid pictures and crime-scene photographs of the subjects they came into contact with while performing their duties. Many of these people were homeless.
A supervisor wrote, "The majority of the photos contained handwritten statements, referencing the subject of the photo in a derogatory manner. Across the room on the west wall was another cork board with photos arranged under the theme of deceased homeless persons. These photos depicted persons of Hispanic origins and contained ethnically insensitive captions. On the north wall, I observed a commercially created 'drug deterrent' poster, depicting officers in tactical gear. The faces of the officers had been covered with photos of faces of deformed and disfigured humans."
In early March, within one week of the 12 News reports, Kerr -- who was not mentioned in our reports on the Dobson Bike Patrol -- was placed on paid administrative leave from MCAO while an internal investigation of his activities was conducted.
On March 10, an internal email was sent to MCAO attorneys and staff from Ken Vick, the pretrial division chief who oversees attorneys and staff in charging, diversion, grand jury and preliminary hearings. In part, it read:
"Investigations was on site today and I believe they had a flyer for our receptionist, but you need to be aware that Deputy County Attorney Jeff Kerr is on administrative leave and is not to be on county premises without an escort from investigations.
"I do not anticipate any issues, but it is very easy and very common for attorneys to let other attorneys 'piggy back' into our secure areas so we need to be sure that does not happen.
"Attorneys and staff need to know only that he is not to be in the office or building without an escort. If he attempts to enter without one, they should notify me, Victor Cook or investigations immediately. He also should not be contacting anyone in the division other than his supervisor."
Vick concluded his email reiterating he did not anticipate any issues, but said everyone needs to be aware of these restrictions.
County Attorney Montgomery will not say what caused his office to put Kerr on leave and trigger the investigation. Montgomery did say the position Kerr was in when he was put on administrative leave was part of a pilot project to establish a community-based prosecution model. That's the High Enforcement/Community Prosecution Project.
"That did require a more-permanent, consistent relationship between a prosecutor and a law enforcement agency," Montgomery said.
Emails show Kerr was working directly with Mesa police officers from late 2012 to 2014. Some of them had been disciplined in 2008 for misconduct, documents show.
Det. Ryan Hunt posed as a Nazi stormtrooper. Sgt. Kevin Gillis, a white police officer, donned a black latex mask and posed as a black drug lord.
We asked County Attorney Montgomery if he was aware of this.
"Those details were not known to me so I can't vouch for the accuracy," he said.
Black calls the issue "embarrassing" and a "black eye" for the county attorney's office.
The allegations against Kerr
The Maricopa County Attorney's Office Investigation Division Management Findings Form on Kerr -- referred to as a division inquiry -- reveals during the summer of 2011, while working for MCAO, Kerr carried a firearm onto office property without having the proper authorization which allows personnel -- usually peace officers working with MCAO -- to do so.
The allegation was sustained.
The silencer and destruction of evidence
According to the division inquiry, in 2006 Kerr created and used a sound suppressor for a rifle by placing a two-inch pipe over the muzzle and taping off the end with masking tape. At the time of the incident, the inquiry states, the conduct was classified as a Class 4 Felony.
That allegation was also sustained.
This is the type of crime Kerr specialized in prosecuting. So why wasn't the prosecutor prosecuted?
In a statement, Mesa police spokesman Steve Berry said, "Kerr stated that he made the device and later destroyed the device. There is no prosecutable evidence to support charges."
Allegations 3, 4 and 5 redacted
In its division inquiry, MCAO redacted allegations three, four and five. It is unclear what they were, but the division inquiry paperwork says they were not relevant to employment. 12 News requested MCAO reconsider and lift the redactions, but MCAO declined to do so. So we will never know what else Kerr was accused of doing while a county employee.
Besides the issues with the guns, Kerr accessed internal databases for personal use, according to the MCAO internal investigation. A Phoenix police officer he met on eHarmony, a dating site, became the target of multiple background searches on county systems.
Kerr also looked up that same police officer up on the Brady List, recently renamed the Rule15 Disclosure Database, a database which the county attorney keeps of police officers with questionable integrity.
According to MCAO employee policies and procedures, it's a database that's only supposed to be used by employees for official business.
Mesa Police Explorer
The investigation also alleged when Kerr was a Mesa Police Explorer, without official cause, he ran the license plate of a "pretty girl" driving a Ford Bronco he saw while on patrol, using a police database.
During another ride-along, Kerr used the database to run the license plate of his mother's car to see if her registration was expired.
It's unclear if either license lookup was authorized by Mesa police. A spokesman would not comment.
A May 21, 2014 email between members of the High Enforcement Community Prosecution Project reveals project members wanted to ramp up the program's activities for the summer, but indicated the status of Jeff Kerr was "unknown."
The sudden resignation
Kerr resigned on June 24 before MCAO could conclude its investigation.
According to the division inquiry, Kerr had violated the Maricopa County Employee Code of Ethics, which states the maintenance of high standards of honesty, integrity, impartiality and conduct by county employees is essential to assure the proper performance of county business and the maintenance of confidence by citizens in their county government.
We have repeatedly asked the county attorney's office why Kerr was placed on administrative leave. But the only answer we've been able to get on the record is that it's an internal personnel matter, which Montgomery says he's not at liberty to discuss. We asked again if the MCAO had anything else it could offer and were told they had nothing further to add.
MCAO spokesman Jerry Cobb says Kerr's criminal cases were in various phases and were divided among other attorneys in the trial division after his resignation.
12 News made two attempts by email to solicit Kerr's side of the story, but he declined any response beyond the following:
I am not in a position to comment about issues relating to the Maricopa County Attorney's Office or its cases. You will need to contact the County Attorney's Office Public Information Office for any interviews or comments.
