The attorney who has been representing Paul Greer
– a former tow truck operator facing numerous felony charges
including perjury, extortion, grand theft, fraud and embezzlement –
said
”
I’m out
”
as of Friday.
The attorney who has been representing Paul Greer – a former tow truck operator facing numerous felony charges including perjury, extortion, grand theft, fraud and embezzlement – said “I’m out” as of Friday.
After defending Greer for almost a year in a case that has “changed dramatically from when it was first investigated,” defense attorney Arthur Cantu has requested that he be relieved. The case has turned into an estimated 6- to 7-month jury trial, a “proposition that’s too expensive for Mr. Greer to afford,” Cantu said.
Meanwhile, the defense attorney representing Greer’s father, Vincent Cardinalli, withdrew his representation earlier this year.
Cardinalli and Greer, along with two other family members and a process server, now face a total of 169 felony charges stemming from hundreds of lawsuits filed by Vincent Cardinalli Sr., 64, and his son Paul Stephen Greer, 30, in hopes of collecting towing and storage fees for their defunct towing businesses. Cardinalli’s A&R Towing operated out of Hollister under a number of different names until about 2004, the same year Greer’s B&C Towing, of Gilroy, was fired by the California Highway Patrol for what it deemed business practices bordering on “criminal.”
The duo was arrested June 13, 2007 for 87 counts of forgery, grand theft and other felony charges, according to the Santa Clara County District attorney’s office. More felony counts have been added since then for the current total of 169.
The family is accused of knowingly suing motorists who previously had sold or donated cars years before they were towed, and in some cases had never owned the vehicle. Cardinalli and Greer – formerly Vincent Bruce Cardinalli Jr. – turned their towing businesses into a gold mine, collectively filing nearly 2,000 cases in small claims courts over the past seven years in San Benito and Santa Clara counties, according to a Dispatch investigation. Those cases have left a trail of defendants who say they had little or no relation to vehicles towed by Cardinalli and Greer.
Many motorists who lost cases to Cardinalli and Greer have complained they never received notice of the tow or the fact that they were sued, according to the arrest warrant and a Dispatch investigation.
Efreen Gonzalez was one of hundreds of unsuspecting motorists dragged into court by Greer. Gonzalez, who owns a small Hollister landscaping business, ran afoul of Greer’s B&C Towing when he loaned a maroon 1990 Oldsmobile Cutlass to a relative, who died while in possession of the car. Greer hauled the Cutlass off the street at the request of Gilroy police and, seven months later, sued Gonzalez for $1,945 in towing and storage fees. Gonzalez did not show up for the small claims court trial and lost by default. When he failed to pay Greer, the tow truck owner again enlisted the court’s help, this time to raid Gonzalez’ bank account for the judgment.
That brought Gonzalez and Greer face to face in San Martin small claims court July 6, 2006. His voice choked with emotion, Gonzalez pleaded with Commissioner Gregory Saldivar to prevent Greer from levying his bank account, explaining that he had a family and could not afford to pay. Plus – and this was the crux of his argument – Gonzalez claimed he never received the legal notice of the lawsuit and never had a chance to defend himself.
Despite his pleas, Gonzalez lost the case and had nearly $4,000 drained from his bank account.
“This is the United States, where everything goes by the law,” said Gonzalez, 37, a father of three who moved from Jalisco, Mexico 20 years ago. “I don’t think the law worked in my case.”
Documents Greer submitted to the court told a different story: A vehicle registration showed Gonzalez owned the car; a certified mailing receipt showed that he was notified of the car’s sale; and a process server’s sworn statement showed that a notice to appear in court was hand delivered in April 2005 to Gonzalez at his Gilroy home on Driftwood Terrace.
Gonzalez tried to explain that he had not lived at the apartment for a decade, but Commissioner Saldivar cut him off after a few seconds. Gonzalez was ordered to return with financial documents to prove his claim that he could not pay. He lost the case and paid nearly $4,000, much of it for Greer’s court fees and late payment penalties, he said.
Months after the court’s ruling, however, a Gilroy property manager corroborated Gonzalez’ story. No one named “Gonzalez” lived in the Driftwood Terrace apartment in the five years since South Valley Property Management took over the apartments, Sue Fullington told the Dispatch in November 2006. In a sworn affidavit filed in court a month later, she went even further, stating that the apartment was vacant on the day that Greer’s process server, Jeff Horan, purportedly hand delivered the summons to Gonzalez.
In the year since the ruling against Gonzalez, dozens of similar allegations of wrongdoing by Cardinalli and Greer have surfaced. The accounts, along with evidenced amassed, have been enough to spur the Santa Clara County district attorney’s office to bring suits against Cardinalli and Greer.
Cardinalli, who was taken into custody in a San Martin courtroom in January could be sentenced to life in prison because of California’s Three Strikes law. He is being held in a Santa Clara County jail without bail.
All five defendants were expected to enter pleas at a Feb. 29 hearing. However, the hearing was a “non-event,” said Supervising Deputy District Attorney Julius Finkelstein. The case was continued while defendant Cardinalli is procuring new legal counsel, Finkelstein said.
