Former Mercedes superintendent pleads not guilty; faces 7 years

MERCEDES — Former Mercedes Supt. Jesus Gandara Sr. was arraigned in California on eight felony and three misdemeanor charges and faces up to seven years in state prison.

Gandara pleaded not guilty to the charges, according to a San Diego District Attorney office press release dated Jan. 13.

The longtime Mercedes superintendent was, in 2003, one of five finalists for a Brownsville Independent School District Superintendent position but was not hired.

Gandara was Mercedes ISD superintendent for the from 1997 to 2004, according to his resume which was provided by the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Eddie Howell, who was board president for Mercedes ISD for two years while Gandara was superintendent, said Monday, “Me and him were on the opposite ends of the situation in Mercedes. I think he saw me as his biggest obstacle. He split the community and families and the school district.”

Gandara’s charges stem from his tenure as superintendent at the Sweetwater Union High School School district in Chula Vista, Calif., a job he held from 2006 until he was fired in 2011, human resource officials from the district confirmed Monday.

Four others were charged and included in the DA’s press release including two Sweetwater school board trustees, a former board member and a contractor who was hired by the school district.

The DA’s press release said the defendants received special favors including meals, tickets and hotel stays from construction companies and thereafter approved school contracts for these companies using Sweetwater bond money.

The charges against Gandara include four counts of perjury by declaration for “failing to report gifts and meals from a developer and willfully and unlawfully stating as true a material matter which he knew to be false,” four counts of filing a false document and three counts of public official-wrongful influence where he used his “official position to influence a governmental decision in which he knew and had reason to know he had a financial interest,” according to the Superior Court of California, County of San Diego Central Division’s criminal complaint.

Attempts Monday to reach Gandara and his attorney for comment were not successful.

In an unrelated case, public records show that Gandara’s brother Guillermo “Willie” Gandara Sr. has been under federal indictment by a grand jury in El Paso since August 2010 in connection with an investigation into corruption.

He has pleaded not guilty.

Willie Gandara, former mayor for the City of Socorro, and also a former trustee of the Socorro Independent School District, is charged with conspiracy to commit mail fraud and wire fraud.

According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Texas, Willie Gandara is among 11 people that were indicted. A statement that the U.S. Attorney’s Office released at the time regarding the charges notes that the indictment centers around a now-defunct vendor, ACCESS Health Source, a third party administrator of healthcare benefits for self-insured entities.

The indictment alleges that ACCESS conspired to engage in a pattern of racketeering activity, including mail fraud, wire fraud and bribery in order to obtain and maintain lucrative healthcare services contracts from several governmental entities.

The charges against Gandara stem from the time he was with the Socorro ISD.

daltenburg@valleystar.com