No new trial for ex-Lake County deputy accused of underage sex

The California Attorney General's Office said Friday it will not refile charges against a former Lake County deputy accused of having sex with his underage nanny.

"We are not going to retry the case" against Derik Dion Navarro, said spokeswoman Lynda Gledhill.

Navarro, 41, was tried on 16 counts of criminal sexual conduct but a Marin County jury deadlocked and a mistrial was declared two weeks ago.

Gledhill said a majority of jurors apparently believed the victim was not credible.

Navarro, 41, served five years as a sheriff's deputy before he was fired in April 2007, a week before his arrest on suspicion of sexual misconduct with two girls, ages 14 and 15.

One of the teenagers later was dropped from the case.

The state Attorney General's Office prosecuted the case after Lake County District Attorney Don Anderson disqualified himself and his office. Anderson, when in private practice, had represented Navarro during an administrative hearings on the allegations.

Prior to his trial, Navarro pleaded guilty to a single count of unlawful intercourse with a minor but Sheriff Frank Rivero complained that the plea deal was too lenient and a judge agreed. The plea agreement permitted Navarro to serve three months in jail, with three years probation.

Navarro was charged with five separate offenses, including unlawful intercourse with a minor under age 16, sodomy with a minor under age 16, oral copulation with a minor under 16, and sharing or sending arousing material with a minor, as well as a separate charge because the child was 14 or 15, court records show.

Rivero said Navarro met his victim while working as a school resource officer at Middletown High School, and that Navarro used the department's computerized reporting system to find out about the girl and her family before inviting her to babysit for his family.

Navarro's attorney, Mitchell Hauptman, could not be reached Friday for comment.

(You can reach Staff Writer Glenda Anderson at 462-6473 or glenda.anderson@pressdemocrat.com.)