Stockton, California—Mayor Anthony Silva (41) is in deep doo as he was arrested yesterday and charged with a variety of morally corrupt wrongdoings—including a felony charge for secretly recording an alleged strip poker game with at least one underage counselor at a summer camp.
Mayor Anthony Ray Silva, 41, was also charged with three misdemeanor counts - contributing to the delinquency of a minor, child endangerment and furnishing alcoholic beverages to individuals under the legal drinking age of 21, according to a criminal complaint filed in court.
Silva is accused of using his cellphone to make an audio recording of conversation among several young people, including a 16-year-old boy, who were playing strip poker with the mayor inside his cabin at the camp.
This apparently took place last summer, at Stockton Silver Lake Camp in Amador County, owned by the city of Stockton and leased out to the non-profit Boys and Girls Club of Stockton. Mayor Silva was the CEO of the Boys and Girls Club of Stockton for eight years prior to becoming mayor in 2013. He still works at the camp during the summer, and was working at the camp this summer before his arrest.
Among other things, investigators found 23 photographs and four video clips relating to a youth camp, later identified as Silver Lake Camp in Amador County, according to officials. The photos and videos were taken between Aug. 3 and Aug. 9, 2015, according to prosecutors.
“In one of the video clips, it appeared that moments after the video began, the phone was set down, darkening the camera lens and thus only containing audio. That clip contains audio of a conversation between participants involved in a strip poker game that occurred in Silva's bedroom,” prosecutors said in a statement. “The conversation between the participants indicated that they were naked.”
The strip poker game is supposed to have taken place in Anthony Silva’s bedroom at the camp. The best that Anthony Silva’s attorney has to offer at this time is this argument—conspiracy.
Silva's attorney, Mark Reichel, said in a statement that the timing of the charges were suspicious. Silva faces a close runoff election in November against City Councilman Michael Tubbs.
"They have had all of this evidence for over a year,” Reichel said. “Unlimited resources have been spent on this in an effort to find something they can investigate. The timing is extremely suspicious as people will only hear half of the story before the election. He will clear his name."
Besides the fact that taking a year to collect evidence on a public official is not actually that long, the fact of the matter is that, according numerous sources—all kinds of shady shit seems to happen around Anthony Silva.
Silva has made headlines Friday after a gun stolen from Silva's home was linked to several crimes in Stockton, including the killing of 13-year-old Rayshawn Harris in 2015.
Silva did not report the gun was missing until nearly a month after Rayshawn's death. In the March 2015 report, Silva said that his home had been burglarized and that his .40-caliber Beretta was taken, along with a 100-quart cooler, a generator, a laser printer, a camera and a game console, according to the report.
According to the LA Times:
In 2012, a 19-year-old woman accused Silva of committing sexual battery a year before. No charges were filed and Silva told a local TV station that the woman was a disgruntled former employee.
A year later, then-City Manager Bob Deis sought an investigation by the San Joaquin County district attorney, claiming that Silva secretly recorded their conversations.
In 2014, the mayor was handcuffed but never arrested after a fight in a limousine. The limousine driver and passengers sued Silva, including a woman who alleged inappropriate advances by the mayor.
If the authorities indeed have “the goods” on this guy, I hope he goes away for a long time. In this case he faces about three years maximum sentence. Hopefully they will add counseling and sex offender status to what seems like a guy with a probable substance abuse issue who is clearly also a walking time bomb.