Man pleaded guilty to affair with 15-year-old daughter of colleague
The sentencing of a retired Santa Monica police officer who allegedly had a long-term sexual relationship with a minor was continued last week for the third time.
Andrew Stein, the private attorney for Gregory McElveen, 55, said he is hoping to keep his client out of state prison where his status as a former police officer and a registerable sex offender would make him a target for assault by other inmates.
If sent to state prison, McElveen would be kept in the general population area of the facility for the 30-to-90-day intake period, Stein said, after which he could be held in protective custody.
McElveen is currently being held at the Twin Towers Correctional Facility in Los Angeles, a county jail, with bail set at $215,000. Stein said he hopes to negotiate a plea so that McElveen can serve out his sentence there.
Since taking the case over from a public defender at McElveen’s April 28 sentencing hearing, Stein has continued the case three times. He said he plans to present a motion to withdraw the guilty plea McElveen agreed to in April and hopes to renegotiate his client’s sentence so it can be served in county jail.
In the meantime, McElveen is earning time credits to use against whatever sentence he will ultimately face.
McElveen, who retired from the SMPD in May of 1999, served with the department for 19 years. He allegedly began a 10-month sexual relationship with the 15-year-old daughter of another SMPD officer in August 2000.
After being arrested by L.A. County sheriff’s deputies Feb. 26, McElveen was charged with performing a lewd act upon a child, two counts of penetration with a foreign object and two counts of oral copulation.
He pleaded guilty to performing a lewd act upon a child April 14 and agreed to spend one year in state prison as part of the plea, which dismissed the four other counts against him.
With good behavior, which can cut a state prison sentence in half, McElveen would have been eligible for parole in six months.
McElveen is scheduled to go in front of Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Michael R. Hoff at the Van Nuys Courthouse on June 27.
Cheryl Gaines, the prosecutor on the case, said she is concerned for McElveen’s safety but that no good reason to reopen the case has been presented to her. She plans to ask the judge to hold McElveen to the plea he agreed to in April.
“It seems to me that there should be some type of procedure that would separate him from the general population just for his personal protection,” she said.
Stein blamed the prosecutor’s reluctance to renegotiate the plea on the father of the victim, a Santa Monica police officer who Gaines said reported McElveen to the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department. That officer is not being named to protect the identity of his teenage daughter.
“He wants my client to be in danger,” Stein said. “He wants my client to be harmed. Who wouldn’t? The feelings he feels are natural but they’re self-centered and very selfish.
“I’m hoping that cooler heads will prevail.”
“I’m hoping that cooler heads will prevail.” — – ANDREW STEIN Defendant’s attorney
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on June 16, 2003. Read the original PDF.