Politics, Government & Business in California's Inland Empire
By Louis Casiano Jr. / Staff Writer
March 17, 2017
SANTA ANA – A private detective who admitted he tried to set up a Costa Mesa councilman for a false DUI and tailed the city’s former mayor using a tracking device was sentenced by an Orange County Superior Court judge Friday to one year in jail.
Luke Money
April 29, 2016
Two private investigators can be tried on charges of false imprisonment and conspiracy in connection with a fake DUI report against a Costa Mesa city councilman in 2012, an Orange County judge ruled Friday.
By Jeremiah Dobruck
Decmeber 16, 2014
Costa Mesa police union suggested ways to catch councilmen in compromising positions, according to emails
By Steven Greenhut
Dec. 12, 2014
The arrest this week of two ex-cop private investigators — charged with felonies related to their alleged attempt to frame a Costa Mesa city councilman for a false DUI — is about more than the disturbing tactics of two hired guns. It offers insight into the way some police unions across California intimidate political opponents into silence.
Posted: Thursday, December 11, 2014 1:11 pm | Updated: 7:59 pm, Thu Dec 11, 2014.
By ADAM ELMAHREK
The Orange County District Attorney’s office Thursday charged two private investigators with multiple felonies related to their alleged efforts to trap two Costa Mesa City Council members in embarrassing or illegal acts, according to a DA news release.
By Joe Nelson, The Sun
Posted: 11/14/13, 7:40 PM PST | Updated: 1 hr ago
An Upland law firm accused of double and triple-billing police union clients across Southern California and bullying two Costa Mesa councilmen now stands accused of planting a GPS tracking device on one of those councilmen’s cars.
By Adolfo Flores and Paloma Esquivel
November 13, 2013, 9:35 p.m.
An Upland law firm accused of bullying civic leaders faced new accusations Wednesday of planting a GPS device on the car of a Costa Mesa official as a way to intimidate him.
By Paloma Esquivel and Joseph Serna
October 16, 2013, 9:21 p.m.
Orange County district attorney’s investigators have raided the offices of an Upland law firm accused of bullying civic leaders across Southern California in its aggressive representation of police and their unions.
Posted: Tuesday, October 15, 2013 3:47 pm | Updated: 7:19 am, Wed Oct 16, 2013.
By NICK GERDA
Orange County district attorney investigators obtained a search warrant late last week seeking records at the offices of an aggressive law firm accused of bullying city leaders across Southern California on behalf of police unions.
By Christopher Goffard, Los Angeles Times
September 16, 2012
One after another, people stepped before the Costa Mesa City Council to decry the blight and lawlessness on tiny Ford Road — prostitutes, thieves, home invaders. What the city needs, they pleaded, is more cops.
Ellis
Posted: Friday, September 23, 2011 2:14 pm | Updated: 10:00 pm, Fri Sep 23, 2011.
NORBERTO SANTANA JR.
Friday, Sept. 23, 2011 | Orange County Marketplace swap meet owner Jeff Teller, a driving force behind the two-year fight to stop the sale of the local fairgrounds, has been kicked off the property.
Orange County Fair Board Chairman David Ellis
NORBERTO SANTANA JR.
Posted: Tuesday, August 23, 2011 6:43 am
Updated: 12:16 pm, Tue Aug 23, 2011.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011 | The Orange County Fair Board’s attempt to privatize the county fairgrounds in Costa Mesa — a two-year saga that prompted multiple investigations and lawsuits — ended last month when Gov. Jerry Brown officially nixed a proposed sale to the Newport Beach-based Facilities Management West.
Published: June 7, 2011
Updated: June 8, 2011 7:33 a.m.
By JON CASSIDY
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
SANTA ANA – The sale of the Orange County fairgrounds to a private company is dead, unless the state Supreme Court resurrects the deal.
The bills for enhanced pension benefits in Costa Mesa, San Bernardino and other cities and agencies are coming due. Drastic cuts and legal battles are just some of the consequences.
By Evan Halper and Catherine Saillant, Los Angeles Times
April 8, 2011
Scores of California government agencies continued to sweeten employee pension plans even after the state’s economy began collapsing into recession in 2008, a decision that is now haunting them as they struggle with deficits and deep budget cuts.
Posted: Tuesday, February 22, 2011 9:58 pm | Updated: 12:59 pm, Tue Feb 22, 2011.
NORBERTO SANTANA, JR. Voice of OC
Wednesday, February 2, 2010 | Last October, when District Attorney Tony Rackauckas cleared former State Senator Dick Ackerman of any illegal lobbying on the proposed sale of the Orange County Fairgrounds, his report stated that Ackerman didn’t violate a state ban on lobbying former colleagues because “his contact was not with state legislators.”
Posted: Monday, February 21, 2011 6:24 pm | Updated: 8:22 pm, Mon Feb 21, 2011.
NORBERTO SANTANA, JR. Voice of OC
Tuesday, February 22, 2010 | The state’s Fair Political Practices Commission has launched an investigation into whether contacts former State Senator Dick Ackerman made with current legislators on behalf of the Orange County Fair Board constituted illegal lobbying.
Published: Sept. 17, 2010
Updated: 6:15 p.m.
By JON CASSIDY
THE ORANGE COUNTY REGISTER
COSTA MESA – Twice before, the board of the Orange County Fair & Event Center has tried to buy the fairgrounds from the state.
Now it says it already owns the property.
Posted: Friday, April 23, 2010 6:01 am | Updated: 6:30 am, Fri Apr 23, 2010.
NORBERTO SANTANA, JR
Friday, April 23, 2010 |The call came late Wednesday night to Kristina Dodge, who had to step out of a movie premier. On the other end was a message from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
“They just requested we don’t take action today,” Dodge said Thursday morning after pulling the plug on a proposal by the Orange County fair board that would have left fair board members in charge of the county’s fairgrounds in exchange for sending some vendor revenue to the state.