Cynthia was good friend worked for Steve Burd
A story today connected to the witness murder In The Matter of Bennett v. Southern Pacific, disgraced and convicted Contra Costa District Attorney
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Ex-Cop Testifies He Watched Colleague Shoot Kidnap Victim
Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, March 15, 1995
George Elzie, testifying in Contra Costa Superior Court under a grant of immunity, said that
defendant
Eric Bergen, a former friend and colleague, fired a round from a sawed-off shotgun into the
body of
Cynthia Kempf, 28, as she lay bound and gagged in a remote field in Brentwood. Kempf had
already been shot more than a dozen times by two other men -- Mario Salguero and Bergen's
brother, Carl -- after an aborted robbery at the Pittsburg Safeway, Elzie testified. Although he had no financial problems, Elzie said, he took part in the crime out of greed -- he had been promised one-fourth, about $5,000, of the
anticipated take. In exchange for immunity from prosecution on murder charges, Elzie has agreed to plead guilty to charges of kidnapping, attempted kidnapping and of using a weapon, said his attorney, Bill Gagen. Elzie, 36, now in custody at Contra Costa County Jail in Martinez, will be sentenced to 12 years and four months in prison when Bergen's trial is over. Elzie was a popular officer who grew up in Pittsburg and was considered a role
model for youths in the community. He was fired last year after a grand jury indicted him on charges of murdering Kempf. Also indicted was Bergen, 35, who has been in state prison since 1990, when he was convicted of a Sacramento robbery.
Bergen had been a SWAT officer in Pittsburg until he resigned in June 1988 -- three months after Kempf's slaying -- amid an unrelated investigation into police brutality. Bergen, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, kidnap for robbery and conspiracy, had been the target of investigators since 1988, when ballistics tests matched one of nine bullets fired into Kempf's back with a 9mm gun found in Bergen's apartment. However, prosecutors did not have enough evidence to try him until Salguero agreed last year to testify against him.
Bergen's younger brother, Carl, also agreed to testify. Elzie, wearing yellow jail clothes and guarded by a deputy sitting behind him, said yesterday that the group planned to kidnap Kempf and force her to open the safe at the Pittsburg Safeway on March 14, 1988. The plan was ditched after they saw a police car patrolling the parking lot, and the woman was driven to a field where she was killed so she could not identify them. Elzie testified that he had never told anyone, including his wife, about his role until he confessed to investigators early this year while awaiting trial. "It was very hard initially to start talking about it," he said, "That's a secret that I held for six years that nobody knew."
