Monday, November 29, 2010 – 11:00 p.m.
Last Updated: November 30, 2010 – 06:45 a.m.
Well…well….well…….
San Bernardino County District Attorney Mike Ramos caught again by state regulators.
After getting fined $200 earlier this year by the State of California Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) for failing to properly disclose $10,000 he paid to his wife from campaign funds, Ramos is about to get smacked again.
This time the proposed fine is $2,500 against both Ramos and his campaign committee treasurer. A significantly stiffer penalty, and one highly irregular for a sitting District Attorney.
But Ramos’ own ethical lapses know no bounds.
It seems San Bernardino County’s illustrious “Do as I say, not as I do” DA intentionally failed to itemize a 2009 campaign-funded credit card charging frenzy on his finance disclosure reports.
Statements prepared, audited and approved by Ramos’ treasurer, San Bernardino-based certified public accountant Marvin Reiter.
Based upon a complaint filed last spring by Sharon Gilbert of iePolitics.com, the FPPC investigated Ramos and Reiter for glaring irregularities involving some $13,000 in credit card charges for the period July 1, 2009 through December 31, 2009.
The report clearly indicated that all of Ramos’ charges were under $100 each and therefore itemization was not required.
However, the FPPC disagreed and found some $8,619 in charges were improperly reported and intentionally not itemized as required by law.
Of the un-itemized charges in question, a whopping $6,239.26 was paid for hotel accommodations and room service to three hotel chains, and an additional $149.08 was paid for booze tabs at the Tartan Restaurant in Redlands, California.
Sources say the Redlands locale is a well-known Ramos watering hole.
The disclosure statement in question was signed by both Ramos and Reiter under penalty of perjury. But of course this new episode was just an innocent oversight.
Maybe those credit card bills were mistakenly generated in Cantonese.
However, it doesn’t appear likely that Ramos’ will prosecute himself, nor will outgoing Attorney General Jerry Brown, who at this point would find no political benefit from doing so.
Ramos, who’s probably hiding under a rock or maybe in a hotel room, sent Orange County-based political hack David Ellis out to handle this mess.
Ellis’ whole effort was to point out the FPPC has not found Ramos’ expenditures to be inappropriate.
Hmm! What a profound statement coming from a source such as Ellis. Sounds more like damage control in the works.
Well maybe someone should ask the FPPC commissioners to take a look before they meet next week.
Even better, maybe Ramos should make his credit card statements and receipts available to not only the public, but his donors who forked over the money for his escapades.
It would be interesting to see who else participated in those hotel stays and what those other 40-plus individual credit card charges of $100 or less entailed.
Last year, county supervisors declined to re-appoint Reiter to the Board of Trustees of the county’s pension fund. A position Reiter and his ilk have continued to lobby for his return.
Especially Ellis, who’s trying to hang on to a no-bid contract he has with the pension fund.
A scenario that is unlikely in the cards after this new stunt.
Does Mikey like it now? Wait until the real charges start once his best friend Moonbeam has vacated the Attorney General’s position. Bad boyz, bad boyz what you gonna do, what you gonna do when WE come for you? The proof is in the pudding, it takes a concerned public (or in this case an employee faced with extreme retaliation by her County bosses for having a blog) to expose the fact that DA Mikey Ramos belongs on the 2010 ACT WALL OF SHAME right between Bell’s Rizzo and the Colonies Settlement unidentified co-conspirator Gary “Oh, not me” Ovitt (the other two uncharged felons Postmus and Biane have already fallen from grace).
isn’t this a felony?
This is a joke….. Why is he still representing the people of San Bernardino County and why is the A.G. office not filing charges against him? politics aside if you work for the government your suppose to do your job and uphold the law… Not bend it to serve your own needs. The penalty for braking the law should be double for these in house offenders that goes for the fifth floor to. What happened to the best intrest of the people? i say they dont want to do their jobs then “we the people”, need to fire them!!!!!!!
@Traci:
Since Brown is the governor-elect, he’s not interested in this stuff anymore. I wish he was, but he won’t do anything, unfortunately.
His buds in the BofI will just cough up the funds for him.
Didn’t these two commit perjury this time. There’s no way this was unintentional. Ramos didn’t wanna reveal all his whoring around in hotel rooms.
Talk about hubris! Ramos is a piece of work but so is the rest of county leadership as well.
It’s, “Do as I say, not as I do” indeed for not only little Mikey but those other members of the good old boy’s network at the County!
And the hits just keep on coming!