Hayward: Ex-police sergeant claims dirty prosecution before he’s sentenced to prison

March 30--HAYWARD -- A retired Hayward police sergeant claimed innocence one more time on Wednesday before he was sentenced to six years in state prison for scamming up to $500,000 from a woman the prosecution described as mentally ill and vulnerable, and the defense as a con artist.

Wearing red jail clothes, which indicates he's in protective custody, Michael Beal, 52, took the stand at his sentencing hearing and testified he found exculpatory evidence during jury deliberations that proves his victim, Pleasanton resident Nancy Joe, perjured herself. Speaking with passion, Beal said he did not get a fair trial because of an unethical prosecution team that hid evidence from the judge and jury. Joe told "one lie after the other," Beal said.

"There are so many issues I have. I'm so disappointed," Beal said. "For my friends, family and loved ones: I did not steal from Nancy Joe."

A jury convicted Beal of nine counts of felony grand theft for $400,000 to $500,000 that he took from Joe between 2007 and 2014. It was one of the more bizarre criminal cases to make its way through East Bay courts because of the facts alleged, the characters involved, and the palpable animosity between the prosecutor and the judge. Seven of his jurors attended the sentencing on Wednesday.

Beal was a decorated law enforcement officer for 27 years before he was forced out by a medical issue. Joe lived with her mother and had hundreds of thousands of dollars in the bank while she spent days on the streets like a transient, collecting recyclables, panhandling and prostituting herself. They met when he set her up for arrest as the undercover john in a prostitution sting. Soon after, she started "working off" her arrest, according to Beal, as a confidential police informant. Beal paid her small sums of money to run personal errands and by the end was accepting sums in the thousands from her for investment real estate -- the existence or nonexistence of which was the crux of the case.

The prosecution argued Beal told Joe that he bought a house in Alameda with her money but he never did, while Beal testified he invested Joe's money in a Modesto house that his ex-wife and two children were living in and he was finally in the position to begin taking over the mortgage payments from Joe when he was arrested in April 2015. Beal said that Joe didn't know the location because that was his condition of them buying together. He said he didn't want her showing up and bothering his family.

Prosecutors say Joe is a diagnosed schizophrenic, and on the witness stand she presented like she has mental health issues. She is also clearly clever, especially about money, leading the defense attorney Austin Thompson to argue that she was not vulnerable as portrayed by the prosecution. During the trial, outside the presence of the jury, Judge Thomas Rogers opined that he agreed that Joe was not vulnerable and lambasted the prosecution team for describing her as such in court documents. In criminal law, a victim's vulnerability can be a factor at sentencing.

Joe, who appears to be in her late 40s, stood next to a victim advocate as a letter she wrote was read. She wrote that Beal tricked her into giving him money by dangling the possibility of marriage. She said she's been humiliated and stripped of her financial security.

"Michael Beal lied to me to get my money and lied to me to get my trust," said Joe, who has testified that she looked up to Beal.

On Wednesday, Beal said he can prove that Joe knew the investment property was in Modesto based on a Bible study video of his daughter on Twitter. Among the accusations against prosecutor Connie Campbell, Beal said rampant prosecutorial misconduct hindered his ability to get a fair trial despite best efforts of the judge.

Campbell was routinely admonished by Rogers, her former colleague, during the trial. She wrote in court documents that Rogers and Beal had a previous working relationship that led to Rogers once writing a complimentary note about his police work in a case file. Rogers said Wednesday that he doesn't remember the acquaintance.

"I'm sickened by the rumors started by Connie Campbell that you and I are friends. I don't know if your an A's fan or a Giants fan," Beal said to Rogers. "All I ever wanted was a fair trial. For you, I know you tried your best."

Beal is appealing the verdicts. He is losing his pension for the years the crimes occurred, according to Campbell.

Outside the courtroom, she praised the jury, which included two finance experts and deliberated for nearly three weeks.

"He is a narcissistic corrupt cop. The jury completely rejected his stories and now he will have plenty of time in custody to face the truth," Campbell said. "The math doesn't lie, even if the defendant does, and that is how the jury came to the guilty verdicts."

"That was wild," one former juror said in the hallway afterward.

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