BY JEFF E. SCHAPIRO

Times-Dispatch Staff Writer

Democrat Mark R. Warner, a candidate for U.S. Senate, is expected to pick up an endorsement tomorrow from a former State Police chief who served him and Republican gubernatorial predecessor Jim Gilmore, said a senior Democratic strategist requesting anonymity.

Expected to endorse the Democratic candidate is W. Gerald Massengill, superintendent of state police from 2000 to 2003.

Kevin Hall, Warner's spokesman, said the candidate would have no comment until tomorrow.

Massengill also served as an interim head of the Virginia Commission of Game and Inland Fisheries after it was rocked by controversy in 2005, the closing year of Warner's term.

But Massengill is probably best known for leading the state commission, named by Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, that examined safety and security issues spotlighted by the April 16, 2007, mass slayings at Virginia Tech.

Massengill later urged the General Assembly to close the so-called gun-show loophole that allows some purchases of firearms without the requisite background checks.

The proposed tightening of firearms laws -- also an outgrowth of the Tech tragedy -- was opposed by the National Rifle Association, of which Gilmore is a director.

Massengill, who started his state police career in 1966, was named state police boss by Gilmore and was retained by Warner.

Warner was also expected to be endorsed by Garth Wheeler, campus security chief at J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College. Wheeler was president of the Paternal Order of Police in the 1990s.

Gilmore, a former attorney general before his election to the governorship in 1997, has depicted himself as a tough law-and-order Republican. Gilmore's first elective office was as Henrico County's commonwealth's attorney.

Contact Jeff E. Schapiro at jschapiro@timesdispatch.com.