A former Santa Clara County Sheriff’s deputy today was banned from any future work as a peace officer in California and ordered to do community service after pleading no contest to reduced charges of fabricating a story of a drive-by shooting four years ago.
Prosecutors said that Sukhdeep Gill, 30, had told investigators that he miraculously escaped injury when a single bullet fired from a passing car struck his body camera while he was standing near his patrol car on a rural road west of Morgan Hill.
After an investigation found evidence, including ballistics, that exposed serious discrepancies in the deputy’s account, he was charged with felony vandalism and suspended from duty.
Despite the objections of the District Attorney’s Office, the court allowed Gill, when confronted with the investigators’ evidence, to enter no contest pleas to the lesser misdemeanor charges of vandalism and filing a false report of an emergency.
Prosecutors said that at 10:32pm on Jan. 31, 2020, Gill hit the emergency broadcast button on his police radio, broadcasting, “Shots fired! Shots fired!” and giving his location on a rural section of Uvas Road in south Santa Clara County.
Officers responded from the Sheriff’s Office as well as the San Jose, Morgan Hill, and Gilroy police departments.
Prosecutors said Gill told the first officer on scene that he had parked on the dirt shoulder to urinate during a routine patrol. While walking back towards the driver side of his patrol car he was shot at by the passenger in a silver sedan that had turned off its lights as it approached him. The deputy said he then fired two shots towards the alleged suspect vehicle, which sped away on Uvas Road.
Gill pleaded no contest to that reduced charge and the crime of false report of an emergency, in exchange for the court’s offer of 150 hours of community service, payment of restitution and the surrender of his certification to the Commission on Peace Officer Standards and Training. This permanently prevents Gill from acting as a peace officer in California, prosecutors said.
“I have gone to officers’ funerals after they are shot,” District Attorney Jeff Rosen said in a statement. “I hope to never hear again about an officer faking being shot. It’s outrageous, diverts public resources, and dishonors officers who put their lives on the line to protect us.”
You write “the court allowed Gill” I would really appreciate a little more detail here. Did the defense counsel negotiate directly with the Judge? If so, who was presiding? Years of watching police procedurals on television have taught me that plea deals are negotiated with prosecutors. Prosecutors who work for the DA. Has television been lying to me? Only you, San Jose Inside, can clear this up for me.