Ex-Santa Rosa CHP officer found guilty of pointing a gun at neighbor’s vehicle

A former Santa Rosa CHP officer who was off duty when he threatened his neighbor at gunpoint was found guilty Friday of two felony charges and one misdemeanor.

Jeremy Finnerty, 49, was convicted of brandishing a firearm at a vehicle and vandalism, both felonies, as well as a misdemeanor resisting a police officer charge related to an Aug. 16, 2019, incident, according to a news release issued by the Sonoma County District Attorney’s Office.

Finnerty admitted to being intoxicated the night he approached the vehicle driven by a neighbor, pointed a firearm at him and threatened to kill whoever was inside.

Finnerty, who was on leave from the CHP because he was injured, said he heard a loud bang about 10 p.m. and came outside to help his neighbors. However, neighbor Kevin Adamson, who also heard the loud noise and left his house to move his car, said he heard yelling and saw a person down the street holding a handgun when he started his car.

The person, who turned out to be Finnerty, started running “erratically” toward him, pointing the gun in his direction and screaming, “I’m going to f---ing kill you!” Adamson said.

Then Finnerty approached Adamson’s home, armed with his 9mm handgun, made further threats and broke a door window while Adamson’s wife, Loretta, was inside, according to the release.

A frightened Loretta Adamson locked the door leading from the house to the garage and a glass door at the back of the house. She ducked down on the floor to call 911 as she heard the man banging on the garage door, yelling, she testified at a preliminary hearing in December 2019.

When she heard the man breaking through the back door, she grabbed her dog and ran out of the front of the house.

“I was terrified,” she said. “I had never been so scared.”

When Santa Rosa police officers responded, Finnerty resisted their efforts to detain and place him into a patrol vehicle. Officer Andrew Castro, who responded that night, recalled that Finnerty told officers that something bad was going on inside the house and started running toward the house. When officers repeatedly told Finnerty to stay back, he became aggressive and yelled at them, using expletives, he said.

Finnerty, who is no longer a CHP officer, will be sentenced July 20 and faces up to three years and eight months in state prison for the felony firearm and vandalism offenses and one year in county jail for resisting a police officer.

“The jury did the right thing by holding Mr. Finnerty responsible for violating the law,” Ravitch said in the news release.

The case was prosecuted by Deputy District Attorney Jonathan Bertz, assisted by District Attorney Investigator Robyn Fuentes. The Santa Rosa Police Department headed the investigation.

You can reach Staff Writer Kathleen Coates at kathleen.coates@pressdemocrat.com.