By Khalida Sarwari
A San Jose police officer pleaded not guilty in court this morning to charges of having sexual contact with two underage teen boys.
Patrick D’Arrigo, 44, was arrested by Gilroy police officers on Wednesday afternoon at the San Jose Police Department’s internal affairs office.
D’Arrigo, a Gilroy resident, was arrested while on duty after a grand jury indicted him on the same day. He was booked into Santa Clara County Jail on charges of unlawful sexual contact with minors and was later released on $100,000 bail.
This morning D’Arrigo appeared in court clad in a dark blue suit with his attorney, Brian Madden, for a brief arraignment hearing. A date for a trial setting hearing was scheduled for Sept. 15 in Morgan Hill.
“He’s obviously not happy about becoming a defendant,” Madden said afterward. “But he will answer these charges.”
The arrest followed an investigation by Gilroy police into allegations of inappropriate contact with the victims, who are 15 and 17 years old. Both are residents of Gilroy, according to Gilroy police Sgt. Chad Gallacinao.
He is facing oral copulation charges involving both victims.
The crimes allegedly occurred on multiple occasions at D’Arrigo’s home on Adler Street in Gilroy in 2008 and 2009.
Deputy District Attorney Stuart Scott said D’Arrigo met one of the boys through a Craigslist dating ad and invited him and his friends over to his house and gave them alcohol. On one occasion, he gave one of the boys a $300 iPod.
Scott said the boy had said he was 18 in the ad, but that D’Arrigo “was aware they were high school students.”
Scott said Gilroy officers executed search warrants at the home and found “extensive evidence” on flash drives, computers and cell phones.
“We believe there is a strong chance there are additional victims,” he said today.
D’Arrigo has been an officer for the San Jose Police Department since 1994, but has never worked in any specialized units, San Jose police spokesman Jose Garcia said.
He was one of two officers who was accused of covering up a DUI crash in March 2008, for which he was placed on administrative leave and then later fired in January 2010. A grand jury declined to indict him, and he was reinstated in December after an arbitrator reversed then-Chief Rob Davis’ decision to fire him.
D’Arrigo has also worked as a campus officer at Leland High School, according to Sherri Greer, a secretary at the San Jose Unified School District Police Department.
If convicted, D’Arrigo faces a maximum sentence of three years and eight months in prison.
