The residents of Pima County have come to expect that few government officials will ever be prosecuted by Pima County Attorney Barbara LaWall. The matter of Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu’s director of communications is not an exception. Tim Gaffney will not be charged in a public-records tampering case.
After a three-month investigation by LaWall’s office, in which it was discovered that Gaffney deleted thousands of e-mails that were sought as public records by The Arizona Republic and law-enforcement agencies, nothing will happen.
According to the Arizona Republic, “In a July 10 letter to Pinal County’s top prosecutor, Pima County Attorney Barbara LaWall said there was “conflicting evidence” as to whether Gaffney knew that the county’s information-technology department had “duplicate backup” copies of his e-mails when he deleted them.”
The key word is “knowingly.” Gaffney had to know that he was committing a crime., and LaWall says that insufficient evidence exists to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Gaffney that the emails “possessed the mens rea — the intent to defraud or deceive — which is a necessary and indispensable element of the crime of tampering or attempted tampering with a public record.”
Gaffney’s deletions were discovered when county officials were trying to comply with a request for information from the U.S. Office of Special Counsel.
The Arizona Republic reports that in an e-mail from Behring to state Solicitor General David Cole, members of the county’s information-technology department were searching computers in the Sheriff’s Office, gathering material to respond to a public-records request.
When IT staff conducted research before March 7 they found a computer file controlled by Gaffney. The file contained 7,220 documents, and when they went back on March 7, that same file contained only 818 documents, according to the Arizona Republic.
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