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Victoria’s police chief and former city attorney leaked secrets and tampered with an investigation, a grand jury indictment alleged Tuesday.

Chief Bruce Ure and David Smith are accused of four felonies: misuse of official information, aggravated perjury, tampering with a witness and criminal conspiracy. Both were also indicted on official oppression, a misdemeanor.

“Secrets need to be secret,” District Attorney Stephen Tyler said of the charges.

Ure remains on active duty as police chief, Mayor Will Armstrong said Tuesday afternoon. The mayor strongly defended the indicted pair and accused the district attorney of playing politics.

Here’s where the basis for the indictments begins: The same grand jury charged former Sheriff Michael Ratcliff on Oct. 25 with three counts of sexually assaulting a teenage boy.

While sheriff in 1997, Ratcliff went online, posed as a woman and lured a teenage boy from his home, according to the October indictment. Ratcliff is accused of offering the boy a swap of sexual favors for a nicer cell in the hospital wing when the boy was an inmate.

Ure and Smith talked to Advocate reporter Gabe Semenza about the Ratcliff investigation sometime around Aug. 5, which was a misuse of official information, according to Tuesday’s indictment.

Semenza did not write about the sexual assault case until Oct. 25, the day Ratcliff was indicted.

Tyler wouldn’t talk about specific charges Tuesday, citing ethical prohibitions. But leaking information — to reporters or anyone else — is a serious problem that damages investigations, he said.

Ure and Smith met with journalists because they worried the Ratcliff investigation, headed by the Department of Public Safety, had stalled, Advocate Editor Chris Cobler said. “They thought it was being buried,” Cobler said, recalling a late October meeting in his office with Smith and Mayor Will Armstrong. The Advocate outlined the city’s concerns in an Oct. 28 story. A newspaper is a good place to go with such concerns because journalists investigate independently, Cobler said.

Ure and Smith also are accused of lying under oath about whether they met with journalists, resulting in the perjury charge.

While they talked to the press, Ure and Smith arranged other meetings, according to the witness tampering charge. The pair told Ratcliff’s accuser in August that he wasn’t safe and he should talk only to police, not the district attorney’s investigators, according to the indictment.

Also in August, Ure and Smith impeded DPS investigator John A. Schlinger’s probe into the Ratcliff case, according to the indictments.

Schlinger wouldn’t comment Tuesday.

The end of the indictment wraps all four charges into an allegation of criminal conspiracy.

Sheriff T. Michael O’Connor arrested Ure in his office and Smith in his home early Tuesday afternoon. They were released on $25,000 personal recognizance bonds.

Smith hasn’t hired a lawyer yet, he said. He declined comment.

Greg Cagel, who works with the Texas Municipal Police Association, will represent Ure. Cagel could not be reached for comment.

Cagel defended Victoria Police Officer Carlos Javier Echeverry in a sexual harassment trial last May. Echeverry was acquitted of the charge, and Tyler was highly critical of the city for keeping the officer on the force.

Tyler has called the Echeverry trial the start of the rift between him and Ure.

Squabbles between Ure and Tyler emerged publicly in August.

“There was still a working relationship,” Tyler said. “At times, it was difficult.”

Even with the latest bumps in the road, the wheels of justice should keep on turning in Victoria, Tyler said.

Victoria County District Judge Juergen “Skipper” Koetter, who mediated the dispute between the DA and law enforcement, said the indictments could erase the deal worked out in January.

“This could throw a monkey wrench back into all the things we’ve tried to work out,” said Koetter, who mediated talks between the police chief, the sheriff and the district attorney.

Ure didn’t want to say much after his release. He stood in front of the Victoria County Sheriff’s Office with an empty holster — he voluntarily left his gun at the police department.

“I’m headed back to the office now,” Ure said.

Leslie Wilber is a reporter for the Victoria Advocate. Contact her at 361-580-6521 or e-mail her at lwilber@vicad.com.