Dave Bonillas served as a San José Police Reserve Officer from 1993 to 1995 and was hired as a full time Police Officer with the San José Police Department.  Dave was assigned from 1998 through 2000 to the Street Crimes unit investigating graffiti vandalism cases and then he was reassigned to the Field Training program in 2000.  In 2001 Dave served as a Deputy for Mariposa County working patrol functions and he returned to the San José Police Department in the same capacity in 2003.  Dave was then reassigned to the Metro unit to investigate graffiti vandalism cases in 2004.  Currently, Dave is serving the Bureau of Investigations as a Detective for the Megan’s Law sex registration detail.

While assigned to graffiti investigations in 1998, Dave taught a three hour class to convicted vandals/taggers and their parents.  The general topics were legal issues, health issues, penalties for vandals and parent responsibilities.  Several hundred students and parents attended this class. 

Dave trained graffiti investigation techniques to new police recruits at the San José Police Academy.  He also taught school administrators and teachers about graffiti vandalism and various techniques to properly identify vandals on their campuses.  Dave has been contacted by several Police agencies and has trained their Department members on graffiti investigation techniques.  The following are some of those agencies: Washington, Oxnard, Visalia and Fresno.

The Santa Clara County Superior Court deemed Dave a graffiti expert during trial testimony on several occasions.  As a leader of the Bay Area Graffiti Task Force called TAGNET Dave came in contact with other law enforcement personnel that discussed strategies of combating graffiti on a monthly basis.

Dave participated in policy discussions with the Santa Clara County Juvenile Probation Department, Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office, San José Department of Parks, Recreation and Neighborhood Services and Superior Court Judges in determining the proper punishment for convicted graffiti vandals in Santa Clara County.  The result of those discussions was a program called Tag You Lose that resulted in increased penalties for convicted graffiti vandals in Santa Clara County.