County Security Chief to Plead to Misdemeanor

The chief of Los Angeles County’s security force said Tuesday that he will plead guilty to a federal misdemeanor for improperly storing explosive devices in an Agoura Hills storage locker.

Bayan Lewis, who also is a former interim chief of the Los Angeles Police Department, said pleading guilty to the misdemeanor charge would not preclude him from continuing as chief of the county’s Office of Public Safety, but that he told his boss he would be willing to resign if necessary.

“I feel bad,” Lewis said in an interview with The Times. “It’s the appearance that I’ve done something horrible.”

Lewis, 57, said he signed a plea agreement last week with federal prosecutors who will recommend that he be sentenced to probation, pending the approval of a judge. Assistant U.S. Atty. Michael Terrell, the prosecutor on the case, declined comment.

Lewis said the devices in question are grenade simulators, practice grenades and smoke grenades left over from his days in the National Guard. He said he used the devices during training sessions in the 1970s and ‘80s and had forgotten some were still kept in his storage locker. Only the grenade simulators, which he likened to M-80 explosives, are capable of serious injury, Lewis said.

Although it is against military policy, Lewis said it was common for reserve officers to carry unused explosive devices off base in the trunks of their cars and then bring them back when they returned for training.

But, according to federal law, such devices must be stored in an ammunition bunker, he said.

Lewis, who spent 34 years with the LAPD before taking the helm of the county’s 500-officer public safety department last year, said he was deeply embarrassed by the indiscretion.

“It’s made my life miserable for a year,” he said. “I’ve been sick over this damn thing.”

Lewis’ boss, Michael J. Henry, did not appear so alarmed.

“This is not a major issue. It’s almost like a traffic ticket. And I’m not trying to say a traffic ticket can’t be serious. But it doesn’t mean the end of your career,” said Henry, the county’s director of personnel.

The case stems from an incident last May in which federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents seized four assault rifles and three inoperable World War II-era machine guns from Lewis’ former home in Agoura Hills and from a storage locker on Agoura Road.

Lewis said he invited the agents to search the properties and take the weapons after his estranged wife threatened to report him to the agency.

It was then that agents discovered the box of grenades, Lewis said.

He said he gave statements to the bureau and U.S. attorney’s office over the last year, and that federal prosecutors only recently asked him to plead guilty to the misdemeanor.

Lewis said he did so to avoid the embarrassment of a trial, and because he was worried that, if he did not, prosecutors might file felony charges in connection with a box of machine gun parts also discovered in the locker. He said he had purchased the parts legally, but was told by prosecutors that when stored with other parts, they could represent a violation of federal law.

Lewis said all of the firearms were legally purchased and owned and were part of a collection he had been amassing from the time he was 16. No charges are expected to be filed in connection with the weapons, although Lewis said prosecutors are seeking to keep two of the assault rifles.

After signing the plea agreement last week, Lewis said, he wrote a letter to the county Board of Supervisors stating his willingness to resign. He said he gave the letter to Henry to deliver to supervisors.

But in an interview with The Times, Henry said he instructed Lewis to rewrite the letter and address it to him, not the board. He said he also told Lewis to leave out any reference to resigning, that it would not be necessary.

“I reviewed this particular case with county counsel and concluded it does not have any legal effect on his employment with the county, nor will it jeopardize his peace officer status,” Henry said. “While unfortunate, I don’t believe that it will in any way jeopardize his ability to perform his duties in his current post.”