SAN DIEGO (Press Release) — San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie M. Dumanis announced on Wednesday, July 2, the end of a wide-ranging public corruption case involving 18 defendants connected to three school districts in South County, including Sweetwater Union High School District, Southwestern College and the San Ysidro School District. The defendants – who included administrators, trustees and contractors – were originally indicted by a grand jury in December 2012 on multiple counts including bribery, perjury, filing a false instrument, influencing an elected official and obtaining something of value to influence a member of a legislative body.
The cases centered on a ‘pay-for-play’ culture with businesses that were awarded voter-approved bond projects worth hundreds of millions of dollars. The successful prosecution, believed to be the largest of its kind in San Diego County, came to an end as the last sentence was handed down by Superior Court Judge Ana España on Monday.
Highlights from the cases include:
• eight guilty pleas to felony crimes
• 12 guilty pleas to misdemeanor crimes
• more than $80,000 in fines
• 1,140 hours of community service
• positive changes in leadership and policies at the school districts involved
• proposed statewide legislation designed to prevent similar cases
“These defendants were greedy board members and administrators who lost sight of the students and teachers they were supposed to serve,” DA Dumanis said. “For years, public officials regularly accepted what amounted to bribes in exchange for their votes on multi-million dollar construction projects. The public corruption was nothing short of systemic and I’m very proud of our office’s work to stop it.”
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Keeping Up With Jewish Public Officials: Bonnie Dumanis
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During the course of the case, defendants pleaded guilty one-by-one, creating reverberations and reform across the state related to school board campaign contributions and school bond contract oversight. Four trustees at Sweetwater Union High School District resigned or were removed from office, one San Ysidro school board trustee resigned from office, and one Southwestern College board member cannot run for elected office for four years.
As the cases moved through the criminal justice system, the court properly used its discretion to reduce some of the convictions to misdemeanors. Sentencing judges consider numerous factors including the defendant’s criminal history, the seriousness of the offense as compared to co-defendants, public harm, mitigating factors such as collateral consequences to the defendants, and aggravating factors such as amounts of personal gain.
“The fact that some charges were reduced or dismissed during the pendency of these cases does not diminish the fact that justice was ultimately obtained, public officials were held accountable for their criminal behavior, and a culture of corruption has been dismantled,” DA Dumanis said. “Deputy DAs Leon Schorr, Tiffany Scott and DA Investigator Vince Giaime did an outstanding job prosecuting this long and complicated case.”
By making reasonable pre-trial settlement offers, the District Attorney’s Office served the interests of justice while saving taxpayer dollars and scarce judicial resources. It also avoided what would have likely been a six-month-long trial and allows the DA’s Office to continue looking into other allegations of public corruption.
The defendants from the school districts, who were entrusted with making decisions on behalf of the best interests of students and schools, received tens of thousands of dollars worth of meals, tickets and hotel stays from construction companies vying for voter-approved bond projects. Shortly after board members received financial favors, they approved contracts with the contractors for bond projects stemming from Sweetwater’s $644 million Proposition O and Southwestern College’s $389 million Proposition R.
Between 2008 and 2011, the defendants frequented San Diego-area restaurants with contractors and others racking up hundreds of dollars in food and drinks at a time, in some cases reaching more than $1,000 per outing. Defendants were given Los Angeles Lakers playoff tickets, concert tickets, theater tickets, Rose Bowl tickets, Southwest Airlines tickets and trips to Pebble Beach and Napa Valley. Officials did not report the gifts on their Statement of Economic Interest, as required by state law. In other instances, administrators and trustees solicited cash for their children’s beauty pageants or national conferences held on the East Coast. They also demanded campaign donations and other favors.
As a result of this prosecution, and in addition to the sentences and school board resignations, the impact has been far reaching. The case prompted Assembly Bill 1431, which is currently making its way through the state legislature and seeks to ban school and community college administrators from soliciting or accepting campaign donations for their elected officials. A citizens group filed a civil law suit to cancel more than $41 million in contracts against three of the companies involved in wining and dining South Bay school officials. There has also been a major loss of income to contractors and their companies involved in this case, which has set an example for their associates around the state that such corruption won’t be tolerated.
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Preceding provided by District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis