OAKLAND — As the 2023 East Contra Costa police corruption scandal comes to a close, federal prosecutors here are asking a judge to doll out the harshest penalty yet for a former Antioch police officer convicted of distributing steroids and conspiring with colleagues to hurt civilians for sport.
Devon Wenger is the last of 14 ex-Antioch and Pittsburg cops to be convicted in a far-reaching FBI and Contra Costa District Attorney investigation.
The path toward his eventual guilty verdicts was fraught with mishaps and twists, including a mistrial, the dismissal of his then-lawyer and multiple public attempts by Wenger to rebut government’s narrative of him as a rogue cop in a troubled department, through his insistence that his entire prosecution is the corrupt result of his own efforts to expose wrongdoing by his colleagues.
During the case, Wenger discussed his case on a law enforcement podcast, petitioned President Donald Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi for help, and boldly declared victory in a news release issued months before his multiple convictions, stating that “justice ultimately prevailed” after his mistrial.”
“This case was never about justice — it was about silencing me. . . The prosecution lied, withheld evidence, and waged a smear campaign against me. But the government failed,” Wenger said in the release.
But now Wenger is in a federal detention facility, optimistically looking at receiving a three-year prison sentence on Tuesday. That’s what his attorneys have asked for, citing his “history of pro-social behavior” and “very difficult childhood.”
“Mr. Wenger served his country, first in the Army from which he was honorably discharged, then in the National Guard for another nine years. His deployment in Afghanistan involved clearing improvised explosive devices at great risk to himself,” a defense sentencing memo says. “Like many soldiers, he compartmentalized the trauma rather than seek counseling. However, he channeled his pain productively into sports and religion. He volunteered his time to coach youth sports in his church community.”
Prosecutors have countered with a request for a nine-year prison term. They argue his text messages show that he was “relishing doing harm” with then-colleague Morteza Amiri and others. Amiri, an ex-Antioch K9 officer convicted of siccing his dog on a man and conspiring to defraud the city in a college degree scam, was sentenced to seven years in prison earlier this year. Wenger, prosecutors argue, betrayed his oath and his city, and falsified police reports to avoid responsibility for his actions.
“He was a sworn law enforcement officer who was looking to harm people, who encouraged and applauded other officers who harmed people, who helped to illegally distribute drugs, and who covered up what he did by deleting and falsifying evidence,” the prosecution sentencing memo says. “This was not accident or oversight. An appropriate sentence would spotlight and deter such bad police conduct.”
The incidents cited by prosecutors include one in 2019, when Wenger broke a woman’s arm and smashed her sister’s face into the side of a police car, while investigating shoplifting. Later, he told his then-colleague Eric Rombough — who pleaded guilty to conspiracy, civil rights violations, and then became a government witness — “the (expletive) got what she deserved,” according to prosecutors.
Typically, judges look at not only the offense conduct but factor’s like criminal history, the defendant’s acceptance of responsibility, and his or her life story. Wenger is set to go before White at 1 p.m. on Tuesday.
In the steroids case, Wenger was convicted of arranging to buy steroids for personal use and to give them to other cops, based on text messages and the testimony of other peers in law enforcement, including a co-defendant, Daniel Harris. For years, Wenger has insisted that he never arranged to buy steroids, accusing a Contra Costa DA inspector of “injecting” fake messages into his phone.
At the start of 2025, Wenger and Amiri were set to go to trial together. Just days into it, Wenger’s lawyer, Nicole Lopes, insisted on a mistrial, stating she was overwhelmed by lack of support and her own personal struggles. White granted the mistrial but later accused Lopes of “lack of candor” with the court after she appeared on a podcast and — according to White — contradicted what she’d told him in a sealed court hearing. White later removed Lopes from the case and Wenger was given a new lawyer.
During his second trial, White dismissed one count against Wenger, involving the use of a less-lethal gun on a suspected car thief. The jury convicted Wenger of conspiracy the following day.