Another lawsuit filed Tuesday cites an investigative report that
alleges several counts of corruption by county government
officials
– including acts of profiteering, tax evasion and open meetings
law violations.
The suit filed with the San Benito County Superior Court is
requesting any profits gained from those alleged activities be
returned to the county. It is also requesting a vehicle maintenance
contract be revoked because of an alleged conflict of interest.
Another lawsuit filed Tuesday cites an investigative report that alleges several counts of corruption by county government officials – including acts of profiteering, tax evasion and open meetings law violations.
The suit filed with the San Benito County Superior Court is requesting any profits gained from those alleged activities be returned to the county. It is also requesting a vehicle maintenance contract be revoked because of an alleged conflict of interest.
The plaintiff is Juan Monteon. He is a county resident and a bail bondsman who works in San Jose, according to his Salinas lawyer Michael Pekin.
“He’s the one who said, ‘I’ve had enough,'” Pekin said Tuesday of Monteon, who Pekin said asked to get involved after reading about the investigation in the Free Lance. “This is a matter of Juan Monteon versus Scagliotti and his cohorts.”
Pekin also represented the group of anonymous residents who commissioned the private investigation. Those residents called on Salinas private investigator Dave Henderson for the probe, which is ongoing, about eight months ago.
They call themselves Los Valientes, which means “the brave ones” in Spanish.
Henderson has continually denied to comment on the investigation, while Pekin has been the group’s spokesman.
Los Valientes in October also attempted to join a separate lawsuit – Rebecca McGovern versus San Benito County – which attempted to enact the Growth Control Initiative set for the March ballot. That intervention request was denied by a judge.
Los Valientes, however, is not directly associated with the suit filed this week – aside from use of the investigative report as substantiation, according to Pekin.
“Anybody can file a lawsuit at any time against anything,” Supervisor Pat Loe responded Tuesday.
Of the five allegations, the suit includes three counts of alleged corruption specifically naming Supervisor Richard Scagliotti, who has announced he will not run for a fifth term on the Board in November.
Those include one allegedly fraudulent land deal from which the Board chairman profited; a request for Scagliotti to repay upwards of $137,000 for a county-financed pipe upgrade to one of his developments; and a request to revoke the county vehicle maintenance contract awarded to a prospective business partner of Scagliotti’s.
Scagliotti refused to comment when reached on his cell phone Tuesday.
The suit, meanwhile, names all five supervisors in two counts of wrongdoing. One count cites Henderson’s first investigative report and alleges the Board violated the state’s open meetings law, the Brown Act, by helping draft the Growth Control Initiative.
Pekin said this suit, unlike the intervention attempt that requested the initiative be nullified, is not trying to affect the March ballot. It is only to prevent future violations of the law, he said.
“What we’re seeking is that the Board of Supervisors be instructed not to meet with (authors) of the Growth Control Initiative to draft legislation in secret,” he said.
Meanwhile, Board members have become increasingly frustrated with Pekin, Henderson and Los Valientes. And now Monteon has entered the fray.
“There’s no way this Board of Supervisors would do anything to cause problems with the Brown Act,” Supervisor Ruth Kesler said. “We’re all old enough that we know better than that.”
The director of the county’s waste management operations, Mandy Rose, was an initiative author. She called her discussions with Board members during the document’s drafting, “lobbying,” according to the suit and report.
Rose did not return phone calls to her office Tuesday. But she has denied the allegations in previous interviews.
The other count against the Board is a request for the county – as the allegedly profit-bearing San Benito County Finance Corp. – to file state and federal tax returns, according to the suit.
Pekin said the county is obligated to report any profits earned by the corporation, which was created in 1998. The county, the suit claims, has not properly documented those finances.
Henderson is trying to compile information on the matter for possible inclusion in “Part 2” of the investigation, which is expected to include at least six more cases of alleged wrongdoing by county officials, according to Pekin. It is not clear when that second report will be finished, Pekin said Tuesday.
“What does (Pekin) hope to do,” Kesler said. “I don’t really understand the man.”
“The supervisors now,” Loe said, “we’re spending time on things that have no merit or benefit for the community. And we’ve got to get past this.”
After the completion of Part 1 on Aug. 22, it was delivered to District Attorney John Sarsfield. Eight weeks later, one day after the report first went public in the Free Lance on Oct. 15, Sarsfield sent a letter to Henderson stating he would not criminally prosecute any of the allegations.
Since then, the Fair Political Practices Commission assigned an investigator and attorney to examine issues from the report. And Part 2, when finished, will go directly to the state Attorney General’s Office – while a copy will concurrently be delivered to Sarsfield, according to a source close to the investigation.
Regarding the county vehicle maintenance contract held by San Benito Tire owner Bob Cain, Pekin and Autoworks owner Don Kelley throughout October requested the Board consider revoking the contract. The Board denied those requests.
The investigative report contends Scagliotti and Cain were negotiating in 2002 for San Benito Tire to move into a building owned by the supervisor. And Kelley, who worked on Sheriff’s vehicles for several months between the two most recent contracts, claims the work done by Cain has been negligent.
Supervisor Reb Monaco declined comment Tuesday beyond reiterating his trust in the court system.
“I’m staying purposely out of this because at some point I may have to deal with issues that resolve from it,” he said.
Supervisor Bob Cruz did not return calls Tuesday.
