‘I am not beyond redemption’: Facing possible prison time, ex-Antioch cop reflects on a life of hardship
OAKLAND — Earlier in life, Daniel Harris was a soldier, then a railroad worker, then he turned to law enforcement at the Antioch Police Department, seeking a sense of personal fulfillment.
Now, Harris is a convicted felon who testified against a former law enforcement colleague and will face a possible 366-day prison sentence when he goes before U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White on Tuesday afternoon.
Harris, one of 14 ex-East Contra Costa cops charged in August 2023 with a ride range of criminal offenses, pleaded guilty to steroids distribution and falsifying a home loan application, then testified against ex-Antioch police Officer Devon Wenger, who was sentenced to seven-and-a-half years for steroids distribution and conspiracy to violate civil rights last year.
Harris and another ex-Antioch police officer who cooperated with prosecutors, Timothy Manly-Williams, are due in court at 1 p.m. Tuesday.
In the days leading up to his sentencing hearing, Harris penned a letter to Judge White, summarizing his life as a tale of obstacles overcome, traumatic experiences and regret. He describes turning to steroids after several spine injuries in the line of duty, the nightmares that haunt him from the day he tried to save a 2-year-old girl who drowned in a backyard pool and the fateful morning where FBI armored cars drove onto his lawn and burst into his home with flash-bang grenades while he poured milk into his kids’ cereal bowls.
“My children stood frozen as they peeked through the window to watch their father being dragged out in belly chains and ankle shackles, paraded in front of neighbors, their classmates, and their teachers who lived on our street,” Harris wrote.
He described overcoming homelessness and abuse as a child, born to a father who spent years in state prison. He enlisted in the U.S. Army, then later worked for Union Pacific Railroad, but went into law enforcement to fill a “void,” he wrote. In Antioch, his physical and mental health took a serious downturn due to his policing work, he wrote.
“I witnessed tragedies most people will never see, dead children lost to violence, families torn apart by accidents, scenes so horrific they etched themselves into my memory. I woke at night drenched in sweat, haunted by nightmares of the lives I couldn’t save,” Harris wrote.
In 2023, Harris was charged with distributing steroids to other officers. Authorities alleged he was an aspiring bodybuilder who ran a fairly large mail distribution ring, selling anabolic steroids to other cops. These included colleagues in Antioch, like Wenger, and in the Contra Costa Sheriff’s Office, where Harris worked as a deputy before joining APD, according to court documents and public records.
At Wenger’s trial, Harris testified that he’d often sell his own personal stash or place orders for officers with an underground seller out of Florida, who then mailed packages to California. In January 2022, prosecutors say Wenger connected another man — a fellow Green Beret hopeful who was enlisted in the California National Guard but living in Oregon — with Harris to buy anabolic steroids. Prosecutors say the subsequent package of steroids meant for that national guardsman was intercepted by U.S. postal inspectors on its way from Florida to California.
Prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memo that Harris took steps to conceal ordering steroids by arranging for packages to be delivered to a pseudonym at another address, and said his false application for a home loan — all while employed as a police officer — compounds his criminal responsibility. They added, though, that he deserves credit for “truthful” testimony.
Harris asked for “mercy” for his children’s sake and said the life he once enjoyed has been destroyed. The mark of a felony conviction will seriously limit his job prospects forever, and one of his kids is teased at school for having “Pablo Escobar” for a dad, he wrote. Despite all this, Harris wrote he’s still dedicated to overcoming adversity.
“I am not beyond redemption. I am not defined only by my worst mistakes,” he wrote. “I am also the boy who survived when survival seemed impossible, the soldier who served his country, the officer who protected his community and the father who still fights every day to be worthy of his children’s love.”