Alameda County Sheriff's Deputy Fired For Violating Restraining Order

ALAMEDA COUNTY — An Alameda County sheriff's deputy who allegedly once threatened to kill his wife if she ever jeopardized his job has been fired as he faces 18 criminal counts for violating a restraining order.

Travis Brannon was terminated on Friday, according to sheriff's spokesman Sgt. Ray Kelly.

Brannon married his wife on May 29, 2015, but the marriage was tumultuous and quickly deteriorated. When interviewed by a sheriff's investigator, she described him as confrontational and violent, at one point allegedly telling her he would kill her if she ever did anything to jeopardize his job as a deputy.

He said he was affiliated with the Hells Angels motorcycle club and would use those connections to have her killed. Another time, he told her she would get in trouble if she reported any of their relationship incidents,
according to official reports by sheriff's investigators.

He and his wife were both arrested on Aug. 29, 2015, for battering and injuring each other. On Oct. 19, the woman sought a temporary restraining order against Brannon and he was served the following afternoon. A sergeant, detective and a deputy went to Brannon's home to serve the restraining order.

After they explained the conditions to him, which prohibited Brannon from contacting her by any means and from going within 100 yards of her, Brannon said, "Man, I know about restraining orders. I ain't gonna do
anything to violate it. I've been in this house ever since I got released from jail," according to the reports.

But Brannon immediately violated the restraining order, writing her an email the day he was served that said, "This is really how u r going to do ur husband for loving u U lie u cheat I stood by u and love u.. F--- ME
SOME MORE ON SOME MORE LIES"

He sent her at least 10 text messages on Oct. 23 and 24 from various different phone numbers that were disguised through a phone application. Despite the disguises, she recognized the messages as from Brannon because of their content, grammatical errors and poor syntax and sentence structure.

The messages included, "U truly owe me a RESTART" and "DAMMMM I guess I never did mean s--- to you" and "How can I have you back babe please."

On Oct. 24 she received this message: "If u would like to be adults to resolve these issues let's if u still want to get people involved in our matters continue to do what you are doing but when 11th comes you will wish you would of listened for the SECOND TIME like you did when you listened to the 1st time cause things actually get better f Come over and talk to me for reals to work all this nonsense out."

He also sent her messages on Instagram.

Sheriff's Deputy Matthew Skidgel collected her phone and, with her permission, sent a message pretending to be her to Brannon's official sheriff's email address. Brannon got into a conversation with the investigator.

When reminded about the retraining order, he dismissed it as "a piece of paper.

Brannon was arrested on Oct. 28 at a sheriff's facility in Oakland. He admitted to contacting his wife and said he knew he would violate the restraining order as soon as it was served.

While in jail, he called her from his holding cell but she didn't answer. When confronted with the record of the calls from jail, Brannon allegedly threatened Skidgel, telling him, "I got you Skidgel, I got you."

Once released from jail, he continued to contact her. She received mysterious calls from blocked numbers and then a text message from a new phone number he had just registered. Skidgel gave her a voice recorder and
she recorded him calling her at 3 a.m., again telling her the restraining order was "only a piece of paper."

Brannon was arrested again on Nov. 10 after attending a court hearing on the restraining order.

Later that month, he was charged with 18 counts of violating the restraining order and pleaded not guilty to the charges on Nov. 25. His criminal case is still pending.

— Bay City News