Santa Clara Vice Mayor Anthony Becker’s perjury trial is underway, with witness testimony alleging he leaked a 2022 Santa Clara County Civil Grand Jury report.
Becker is on trial for allegedly lying about whether he leaked an early copy of a grand jury report about the 49ers’ relationship with the Santa Clara City Council to former 49ers executive Rahul Chandhok. Becker’s jury trial presided over by Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Javier Alcala began Nov. 6 with opening statements and then three days of testimony from Chandhok, the prosecution’s key witness. Four witnesses, including former interim city attorney Steve Ngo, testified Wednesday after Chandhok wrapped up on Tuesday.
Multiple news organizations reported that Chandhok testified earlier in the trial that he received the report from Becker.
Chandhok’s testimony covered his and the 49ers’ relationship with Becker. Based on reports from multiple news outlets, he said it would have been in the best interest of the 49ers to protect Becker, pointing toward tension with other members of the city council.
The team has feuded with Santa Clara Mayor Lisa Gillmor for years, clashing over late night curfews and Levi’s Stadium management, among other topics. The city settled its final lawsuit with the 49ers over public safety costs earlier this year. The team has spent millions on city elections to get Gillmor out of office and keep her allies from being elected. Becker, who was running for reelection, lost to Kelly Cox, a candidate endorsed by Gillmor.
Wednesday’s hearing began with testimony from Ngo about the legal advice he gave councilmembers in October 2022 around the report’s release. Deputy District Attorney Jason Malinsky honed in on an email that Ngo sent the mayor and councilmembers, where Ngo advised them to not discuss the draft report ahead of its publication, citing privacy laws.
Grant Fondo, one of Becker’s defense lawyers, focused on a different part of the email where Ngo acknowledged the law could be interpreted as allowing the councilmembers to talk about the report before it went public. But Ngo said his advice was to keep the report private until publication never changed.
“I understood that the prohibition on the disclosure may not have meant that much anymore because the contents were already disclosed, but… I didn’t know who had disclosed it,” Ngo said. “There was still a very clear mandate, not imposed on everybody else, i.e. the media, i.e. the leaker or whatever, but on the city council and on the public agency.”
The report made it into the hands of multiple news outlets and Santa Clara organizations ahead of its publication date. The civil grand jury investigated the leak, but turned up nothing.
Jurors also heard testimony from Maggie Carr, employed by Milltown Partners who worked with the 49ers on public relations. She testified that after Chandhok received the report, she and other public relations team members had a virtual meeting to decide how to handle the report’s publication.
Malinsky asked if that discussion included giving the report to “friendly publications,” and Carr replied “yes.” She confirmed the 49ers discussed sending the report to this publication, though the 49ers didn’t want to be the first organization leaking the report to a journalist.
“Oftentimes the first messaging that comes out, the first media about the story, is what people will remember the most,” Carr said. “You want that to include your messaging and your take on the situation and not the opposition’s take on the situation.”
Karen Enzensperger, who sat on the grand jury in 2022, and Christopher Jackson, a senior IT manager for Santa Clara, also testified Wednesday. Enzensperger’s testimony was littered with objections from Malinsky about vagueness and relevance, most of which were sustained.
Jackson was questioned about the city’s cybersecurity and emails that were retained by the prosecution for the ongoing trial.
Becker’s lawyers have been building an argument that he isn’t the only one who leaked the report and lied about it — but he’s the only one who’s been charged. His public defenders sought subpoenas against the Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office and Mayor Gillmor, seeking information on how both parties have handled other grand jury reports, suggesting she may have leaked it, which her political opponents have claimed for years.
The trial resumes tomorrow at 9 a.m. with more testimony from Jackson.
Contact B. Sakura Cannestra at [email protected] or @SakuCannestra on X, formerly known as Twitter.
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