San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan has withdrawn his endorsement of Tam Truong, a City Council candidate and police officer who’s still running for office after county prosecutors charged him with grand theft related to mortgage fraud allegations.
District Attorney Jeff Rosen’s office last week filed a one-count criminal complaint charging Truong with grand theft of personal property — exceeding $100,000 — from Orange Coast Title of Northern California, PHH Mortgage Services, Newrez LLC and American Home Mortgage.
Mahan said that while he awaits the outcome of Truong’s case, he’s withdrawing his support for him in the District 8 race.
“This is a serious charge that requires a fair, thorough and timely investigation,” Mahan told San José Spotlight. “While I understand Tam Truong has stated he is innocent of this single charge, that must now be determined through our judicial system. Given these facts I am withdrawing my endorsement until such time as this case is resolved.”
The San Jose Police Department put Truong on administrative leave in light of the criminal complaint. Truong, who’s worked in law enforcement for two decades and is running against incumbent Councilmember Domingo Candelas for the District 8 seat in November, was sued last year for allegedly defrauding an escrow officer with the Orange Coast Title Company, which allowed Truong to ditch his mortgage and collect nearly $540,000 from the sale of a home.
Sean Webby, spokesperson for the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office, declined to comment on the complaint.
Truong has maintained his innocence — and his commitment to the race for District 8.
“This single-count complaint filed by the district attorney’s office represents nothing more than an allegation. It is based on a misunderstanding of all the facts in this case,” Truong told San José Spotlight. “This matter has been settled through a civil proceeding, which is the appropriate venue. There is no evidence that I intended to mislead anyone. What we have here is a rush to judgment and an effort to criminalize innocent conduct without a full understanding of the facts. The district attorney’s office filed this charge against me on the eve of the election, depriving me of sufficient time to clear my name through the judicial process before voting begins.”
The insurance company’s lawsuit claims Truong “used his position of trust and authority as a SJPD Police Officer to fraudulently convince” an escrow officer that a lien on his property could be removed from a preliminary title document, according to court documents from last year.
The September 2022 lawsuit said Truong showed the escrow officer documents from his 2015 Chapter 7 bankruptcy to help convince her the lien was eliminated from his home on Plumstead Way in San Jose. After defrauding the escrow officer in January 2021, the complaint alleges Truong conspired with two others to sell the Plumstead home in July 2021.
San José Spotlight last year also reported that Truong at one point owed more than $30,000 to a former employee of his private security company, Training and Protective Services. He started the company in 2012 to offer private patrols for neighborhoods just as the city’s police force was hemorrhaging officers due to Measure B, a ballot measure that slashed retirement benefits for SJPD officers. Truong supported the controversial measure in his 2012 council run.
In a wage theft case filed with the state labor commissioner in 2014, one of Truong’s employees, Kevin Halverson, claimed he worked nearly 1,700 hours in the first half of 2013, but was paid for only a little more than 500 hours.
Following a hearing and testimony from Halverson and some of his coworkers in early 2015, the labor commissioner ordered Truong to pay Halverson $34,071 in wages, damages, interest and penalties. Truong’s company dissolved a short time later.
In early 2015, the San Jose Police Department suspended Truong’s department-issued outside work permit, which the department uses to monitor officers’ business interests separate from police work, while police leaders considered whether it was a conflict for him to profit from the department’s short staffing problems.
Truong is running for the same council seat he sought through an appointment process in 2023 that ultimately went to Candelas.
“I have not committed a crime, and I plan to continue with my campaign,” he told San José Spotlight.
Contact Brandon Pho at [email protected] or @brandonphooo on X, formerly known as Twitter.
Tam Truong Complaint
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