Writing OC history: the Bold and the Ruthless

     IT'S BECOMING CLEAR—to me, a slow learner, I guess—that, at least in our benighted county, the phenomenon, in politics, of brazenly deceptive but highly effective “smear” campaign tactics—including last minute (i.e., impossible to counter) attack mailers—was seized upon and perfected by the one-time consulting firm of Butcher-Forde—and by Butcher and Forde considered independently, both before and after that firm. That is, insofar as one dons one’s historian’s cap and approaches the last half-century of OC political campaigning, asking: How did we get here?—well, that answer, more or less, is these guys, William Butcher (now William Lord-Butcher) and Arnold Forde.
     A crucial aspect of Butcher-Forde’s “success,” it seems, was an early embrace of computer technologies—technologies that are not in themselves dubious, but, in the hands of Butcher-Forde, powerfully magnified their clients’ efforts to gain control of government and to shape it for the sake of their dubious and anti-democratic ends.
     But this kind of campaigning, to be effective in transforming the landscape, takes sustained money. Starting around 1970, developers provided that key ingredient. The combo of big developer money and no-holds-barred campaigning was the new animal that metamorphosed Orange County into the hyper-developed and politically nasty place that it is.

     And again, donning one’s historian’s cap in hopes of identifying a meaningful narrative, with beginning, middle, and end—it appears that one will not go too far wrong in starting with the 1969-1970 campaign of Ron Caspers to challenge and replace 5th District Supervisor and Republican Alton Allen. At least as far as the Republican establishment was concerned, Caspers seemed to come from out of nowhere. But he had money. More specifically, he had “Dick and Doc” money. And he had the talents (the ruthless and clever methods) of Arnold Forde (and later Butcher-Forde) plus the uncommon energy and ambition of young Tom Fuentes. Most importantly—and here, I believe, Fred Harber is the crucial figure—Caspers had a vision of how county government should operate. That vision was actualized after his 1970 election, when “Caspers made the contacts and set the ground rules for developer participation in the grand scheme of patronage carried to an exponential degree” (Tom Rogers).
     I’m sure there are many people who understand what I do not: the complex or convoluted sense in which this scheme or these schemes were masterminded. Richard O’Neill (the “Dick” of “Dick and Doc”) was a rich landowner interested in development; but he was also a Democrat who sought to further the success of his party and its philosophies. I have trouble seeing him as intent on establishing a “grand scheme of patronage” unless it was, in his mind, ultimately in the service of Democratic ends. [A friend who has long worked for Democratic candidates seems to disagree; he insists that O'Neill was not at all idealogical; he was simply pro-development.]
     His partner, Louis Cella, was a Republican, but, like Caspers, Cella didn’t seem particularly interested in furthering any particular political philosophy. He was a kind of grifter who got in over his head. Many, of course, have wondered if there were people behind Cella and all that money he controlled. The mob? Who knows.
     What was Fred Harber’s role in all of this? There’s plenty of evidence that he was the brains behind two or three or more supervisors, pulling the strings. He was brilliant, we’re told—certainly Cella thought so—but it seems clear that, like Cella, he was also dirty. I’ve traced Harber’s history back into the late fifties, and, though he seemed always to have an interest in Democratic politics, he was pretty consistently near or in settings of graft and corruption. He’s the one person in this saga who seemed to view himself as some sort of “mastermind,” and he evidently welcomed being seen as such. (See Puppets and Puppeteers.)

     Lobbyists, we know, have a bad reputation; it is such that they would seem to fit right into this world of schemes and quid pro quo deals. Whatever the fate of the grand schemes mentioned above, it seems clear that several persons involved in the early days of our saga—Fuentes, Lyle Overby, Frank Michelena, et al.—went on to engage in lobbying most foul.
     I started my inquiries into this saga because I was intrigued by Tom Fuentes, a trustee in our district. He was a ruthless man who once wielded great power in our county as chairman of the OC GOP. Tom was a guy who always seemed to keep his eye on the larger chess game of local politics and who thus endlessly involved himself in machinations and schemes relative to the remnants of a spoils system he long ago constructed. In my opinion, starting with his chairmanship of the OC GOP in the mid-80s, Tom maintained the grand scheme of patronage initiated by his mentor in the early 1970s. But he did so on behalf of the Republican Party, and especially its right wing. (See What is a Repuglican?)

     But, like O’Neill (at least, as I understand him), Tom was also, in some sense, a true believer in his particular political philosophy. That’s a big part of what made him fascinating. For much of his history, especially his early history, seemed to stand in stark contrast with that philosophy. He was a profoundly contradictory figure.
     Tom noisily stood for principles such as, “Thou shalt not speak ill of other Republicans.” Accordingly, he stood by Republican incumbents. But his start in politics was his substantial part in an effort to defeat an incumbent Republican, Alton Allen—a Republican that Caspers and company spoke seriously “ill of.”
     Fuentes could not abide rogue Republicans: consider his treatment of Republicans who sought to challenge incumbent Republican office holders (see Guiding with an iron hand). But the whole Caspers emergence of 1969-1970 was a rogue project, relative to the party. It utterly bewildered and confounded the Republican establishment of that time.
     Fuentes was known for his intolerance of Democrats—even of “moderate” Republicans, whom he dismissed as “RINOs” or worse. But, between 1970 and 1974, he was a key player in Team Caspers, which included card-carrying Democrats (e.g., Fred Harber) and was linked to efforts to promote and elect Democratic office holders (such as Ralph Clark and Robert Battin).

* * *

     I recently came across some old news articles that help fill out our story.

Wenke

     1. PLEASURES OF THE HARBER. In “Wenke Says He May Sue Over Letter” (LA Times, June 22, 1972), Republican supervisorial candidate William Wenke expressed his intention to sue Robert Battin’s campaign manager of the 1972 primary campaign. Battin’s manager was Fred Harber.
     That’s because Wenke had been “the target of a last-minute primary campaign letter linking him to school busing in Santa Ana….” Wenke, said the Times, “was accused of helping to get pro-busing candidates elected to the Santa Ana school board.”
     According to the Times, “The letter was linked to … Harber, campaign manager for Supervisor Battin, by two former aides to Battin….” (See Puppets and Puppeteers.)
     Wenke had decided that a lawsuit was his only recourse. But he didn’t want money:

“…I make this proposal,” he added. “If you (Harber) will corroborate the statements … that you, in fact, were behind the school busing smear letter, you may consider this a release from any action against you.”

     Harber responded with utter confidence and defiance: “If he wants to file a lawsuit, let him go ahead.” He added:

Quite frankly, I don’t see where school busing is an issue in this campaign since the board of Supervisors doesn’t have anything to do with that….”

     Well, yeah. That's what makes this smear particularly foul!

Segerstrom

     2. THE BOLD & THE RUTHLESS. In “Redistricting Eliminates 4 Potential Battin Foes” (Oct. 29, 1971), the Times reports “redistricting” actions that turn out to be highly convenient for a certain supervisor:

     All of next year’s known potential election opponents of Board of Supervisors Chairman Robert Battin were eliminated by this week’s supervisorial redistricting, detailed maps of the new boundaries showed Thursday.
     The maps … showed that three rumored candidates … were wiped out by shifts of territory from Battin’s 1st District to Supervisor Ralph Clark’s 4th District.
     The residence of a fourth possible opponent … was transferred from the 1st District to Supervisor Ronald Caspers’ 5th District.
     …[That fourth opponent’s] transfer was made public Wednesday when [he] appeared before the board to plead for revision to restore all of his city … to the 1st District.
     That effort failed when Battin, Caspers and Supervisor William Phillips approved the redistricting map as submitted.
. . .
     But it was not until detailed maps of the changes became available that it was known that the population shifts also had eliminated both attorney William Wenke and rancher Henry Segerstrom, both of whom live in the north Santa Ana area.
     Their census tract … was shifted to the 4th District as a finger jutting into the 1st District.
     The change appeared to be politically fortunate for the board’s chairman, but Battin’s executive aide said no thought was given to the residences of potential candidates when the revised district lines were drawn.
. . .
     The change also affected the district residence of two other influential persons connected with county government. Both Dr. Louis Cella Jr. and Fred Harber, close associates of Battin since his election in 1968, live in the area and are now within Clark’s district.

Butcher/Forde, c. 1982

Louis Cella's trial: Harber, Overby, Hoffman and unanswered questions

     This morning, I read a May 9, 1976 LA Times article, a substantial piece of reporting about the trial of the infamous Dr. Louis Cella, who, along with OC land baron Richard O'Neill, ran a campaign financing scheme in the 1970s—benefitting mostly Democratic candidates but also Republicans such as Ron Caspers—known as the "Dick and Doc Show" ("The Case Against Dr. Cella: Bits and Pieces of Paper").
     It was reported by Richard O'Reilly and Tracy Wood. These days, Wood is Senior Writer for The Voice of OC. Don't know about O'Reilly.
     Cella's business interests involved two hospitals, which devoted substantial square footage to non-medical workers and such non-medical activities as printing. Here, hospital funds would be directed to various persons and vendors. Ultimately, Cella was found guilty of a host of illegal activities, including fraud against the state and feds.
     According to the article, one of the ways in which money was dispersed—often to persons having no clear relationship to the hospital(s)—was through postage refunds issued as treasury checks or postal money orders. Presumably, this helped obscure the money trail from Cella to payees:

     The Grand Jury devoted a full day to testimony by Postal Inspector Peter Hickok about how the hospitals spent at least $145,000 on postage for political campaign mailings.
     He said the hospital checks would set up bulk mailing accounts or buy credit on postage meters. But not all of the postage would be used and refunds would be issued in the form of treasury checks or postal money orders.
     The practice involved about a dozen post offices, but at the time Hickok testified, he said, his investigation was incomplete. He said records showed that refunds totaling more than $92,000 were obtained from two post offices alone—Santa Ana and Cypress. Of that, $55,000 went to Butcher, he said.
     Butcher, who has repeatedly refused to be interviewed by Times reporters, was not called as a witness by the Orange County Grand Jury. He was called before the federal grand jury, however, where he reportedly refused to testify.

The O'Neill family (c. 1950)

     "Butcher" was William Butcher of the campaign consulting firm "Butcher-Forde," which became notorious for bringing computer-assisted mailings and new levels of demagoguery and dirty tricks to OC politics. According to Tom Rogers, B-F were also important in the rise of the influence of developers in OC. 

     Fred Harber, Dick and Doc's chief political advisor, was very close to Butcher-Forde. He was also close to Cella, O'Neill, and Caspers.

     You'll recall that lobbyist Lyle Overby has come up again and again in our saga of curious, Fuentes-related political activity forty years ago and thereafter. He, too, received these curious postal refunds:

     Another person who is recorded as having received postage refunds is Lyle Overby, now an aide to Supervisor Ralph Diedrich. In 1974, Overby received $4,600 in 16 money orders acting as an agent for [codefendant Theodore] Schiffman, Hickok testified.
     Overby, who was then working for the late Fred Harber, has refused to respond to a Times query as to what he did with the money.
     Hickok told the jury it is highly unusual for refunds that large to be made in money orders, which are limited to a maximum of $300 each. (Money orders are issued with the payee’s name blank so that the person obtaining the money order can make it payable to anyone he wishes without anyone else knowing.)

     Why did Overby receive payment in so odd and inconvenient a fashion? And just what was he being paid for? Brain surgery?

     You'll recall that Harber's secretary was a woman named Arlene Hoffman, who was ultimately murdered in her Laguna Niguel home (with a cross bow!) twenty years later. That crime was never solved. (See Who killed Arlene Hoffman? ) (Incidentally, Overby had recommended Hoffman to Supervisor Silva, for whom Hoffman was working when she was killed.)

     She was a witness at Cella's trial, but she was decidedly uncooperative:

Tracy Wood (these days)

     Another mystery man in the transcripts is Fred Harber, a political strategist who was closely teamed with Cory, Cella and O’Neill until he was lost at sea with nine others in June, 1974, when his boat sank off Baja California.
     The Grand Jury called Harber’s executive secretary, Mrs. Arlene Hoffman, to testify, but she repeatedly claimed not to know many details of his work.
     Mrs. Hoffman was paid by the hospitals from 1972 until last fall, but told the jury she didn’t do much work at either hospital until after Harber’s death.
     Before that she worked with Harber in Jesse Unruh’s 1973 mayoral campaign in Los Angeles, Democratic Party fund raising, and in the 1974 primary campaigns of Cory, Assemblyman Richard Robinson (D-Santa Ana) and Rep. Jerry Patterson (D-Calif.)
     Mrs. Hoffman testified that Harber was a consultant to the hospitals and said she considered the work she did on politics as public relations for the hospitals.
     (However, Patterson told the Times he was not aware she was being paid by the hospitals during the time Harber was working on his congressional campaign.
     (“If there was public relations for the hospitals, they were doing it very subltey,” [sic] Patterson said. “I didn’t know there was a connection with the hospital.”)
     Dep. Dist. Atty. Brice repeatedly tried to get details of Harber’s activities from Mrs. Hoffman, usually without success.
     “Can you tell us anything that he did for Mission Hospital?” Brice asked. “If he was a landscaper there, you could tell us he planted 15 trees regardless of the day or when it occurred, or if he was a nurse, you could say he changed bed pans or something. Do you know something that Fred Harber did related to the activities of Mission Hospital?”
     “No. I can’t answer that question for you; I can only speak in generalities,” Mrs. Hoffman testified.
     One of the “generalities” was that shortly before his death Harber was working on contracts to help large construction firms win approval for their projects from city and county governments.

     What was Hoffman's motive in revealing so little about her and Harber's activities? By the time of the trial, Harber had been dead for nearly two years. Was she motivated by loyalty? By self-interest? (Note: Pam Zanelli, later a SOCCCD PIO, was among those working in the "political" wing of the hospital at the time.)

     You'll recall that, according to developer Richard Jordan, Harber and Caspers were shaking him down for "help" in overcoming county non-approvals that his construction project had encountered. This was at the time of the Shooting Star sinking in June of 1974.

     Caspers, Harber, and eight other men perished in that disaster. Their bodies were never found despite a massive search. (Cella desperately searched for his man Harber long after the "official" searches were abandoned.)

     Like Tom Fuentes, Lyle Overby was supposed to be on that fateful boat trip. But he bailed after its first leg (to Cabo San Lucas). Richard Jordan was also invited but declined (for he wanted the DA to record conversations, which would have been impossible in Mexico).

     It's all very odd.

May 9, 1976 - LA Times - Case against Cella

Former SOCCCD director of public affairs Pam Zanelli once worked for Dr. Louis Cella

Welcome to the OC

     I thought I smelled a rat, and I was right. (See Remember Zanelli?)
     I did a little more looking into Pam Zanelli’s background and discovered something very interesting.
     First, a little review. Denizens of the SOCCCD will remember Pam Zanelli as the notorious political consultant, hired by the corrupt Old Guard (the secretive leadership of the SOCCCD’s faculty union) back in 1996, in a desperate effort to get its slate of “fiscal conservatives” elected onto the board. (Once elected, the new board would reward the union with a contract giving leadership an array of goodies.)
     Zanelli, a Democrat, had advised the group that benefits for same-sex partners was a “hot-button issue” among local Neanderthals—er, Republicans. And so union leadership, exhibiting a startling lack of principle, sent Republican households the infamous red “same-sex” flier, which relied on distortions, misrepresentations, and (of course) homophobia to persuade voters to vote against the opposing slate (called PIE), led by Dave Lang.
     The flier worked (only Lang prevailed over a union candidate, viz., Davis). By December of 1996, the union had its majority on the board. The era of the notorious "board majority" (at first John Williams, Steve Frogue, Dorothy Fortune, and Teddi Lorch; after the election of '98, Williams, Frogue, Fortune, Nancy Padberg, and Don Wagner) commenced. Everything went to hell, and fast.
     In 1997, despite the obvious conflict of interest, the board hired Zanelli as their chief PR flak. They kept her for two or three years, but she somehow inspired the enmity of Padberg or Fortune (not sure), and so she got canned.
     Recently, I noted that she had previously worked for Paul Carpenter, a corrupt local (and state) politician associated with “Dick and Doc”—Dick O’Neill and Dr. Louis Cella—the infamous campaign finance partnership that essentially “bought” the OC Board of Supervisors in the 1970s—Orange County’s most dramatic era of corruption.
     Paul Carpenter had also been involved (in 1969 or 1970) in Ronald Caspers’ ruthless campaign to discredit Republican Supervisor Alton Allen. Like Carpenter, Ron Caspers was among D&D’s stable of politicians. (It seems likely that the effort to target Allen was directed by Fred Harber on behalf of D&D.)
     And, of course, throughout this period, Tom Fuentes was Ron Caspers’ right-hand man.

* * *

Caspers' left-hand man

     ZANELLI AND CELLA. Today, I did more digging and discovered that Zanelli was much closer (in some sense) to the Dick and Doc operation than I had thought. She actually worked for Louis Cella in one of his hospitals!
     Lemme explain. In January of 1979, Republican Harriett Wieder had just been elected as Orange County’s first female Supervisor. She had replaced Laurence Schmit, a Republican who had been among O’Neill and Cella’s stable of hinky pols. (He somehow managed to avoid the attention of OC DA—and Republican—Cecil Hicks, who vigorously pursued anti-corruption prosecution at the time.)
     On Jan 18, 1979, the Times (“New Supervisor Has 5 Women on Staff of 7”) listed and described Wieder’s new staff:

     —Mrs. Zanelli, 32, of Santa Ana, who handled press relations in Mrs. Wieder’s campaign and is one of three Democrats on the Republican supervisor’s staff.
     Mrs. Zanelli … has worked in the campaigns or offices of Rep. Jerry Patterson (D-Santa Ana), state Sen Paul Carpenter (D-Cypress) and Assemblyman Chet Wray (D-Westminster).
     She also did political publicity work for former Democratic financier Dr. Louis J. Cella Jr., receiving $5,400 from one of Cella’s hospitals in 1974. Cella is serving a federal prison term for income tax evasion and embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars from two Orange County hospitals.
     “I was one of the people who didn’t know what Cella was doing,” Mrs. Zanelli said. Mrs. Wieder said she was “totally unaware” of Mrs. Zanelli’s work for Cella. “I brought Pam on because she is great on research,” the supervisor said.
     She will handle publicity and appointments to commissions for Mrs. Wieder.
     —John P. Erskine, 27, of Huntington Beach, the only holdover aide from Mrs. Wieder’s predecessor, Laurence Schmit….

     I’ve talked to reporters who were there in 1974. One described how Cella’s hospitals would have large wings devoted to political activity—nothing medical went on there. 
     “There was all this printing equipment there," said one reporter. "It was strange.”
     Evidently not so strange to Pam Zanelli!
     By September of the same year (1979), Zanelli left Wieder “to do political consulting work…” (LA Times, Sep. 16, 1979). (I should note that Zanelli seemed to be back working with Supervisor Wieder again in the late 80s.)
     A bit after her 1979 exodus from Wieder’s crew, Zanelli pops up in connection with Governor Jerry Brown (who was known to be friendly with campaign contributor Cella). In 1981, the LA Times (“Visit linked to possible senate bid," Feb 28, 1981) reported about a recent “little-known” visit by Brown to Orange County. At the time, Democrats grumbled that Brown hadn’t given OC enough attention, and so a group of Democrats, including Pam Zanelli, organized a wine-and-cheese party at the Huntington Beach home of somebody named Francis Malloy. Lots of wealthy Dems and Repubs were invited.
     According to the Times, “Among those who attended were business executives and developers invited by Frank Michelena, a well-known Orange County lobbyist.”
     Frank Michelena?

     THE MICHELENA MAN. Michelena’s name is one that pops up throughout OC’s (shady) history going back more than forty years. He was a notorious “lobbyist,” someone who was hired to get a firm close to people, including public officials, who decided who'd get lucrative contracts. (We've mentioned Mr. Michelena's "generous" ways previously: 1976: Tom Fuentes, lobbyist, deputy.)
     —Kinda like Lyle Overby and, um, Tom Fuentes.
     Now, as it turns out, Michelena worked with Tom Fuentes during the latter’s formative years as a political apparatchik/consultant/gopher.
     According to former OC GOP chairman Tom Rogers, in about 1970,

     Caspers hired a young graduate of Chapman College ... to serve on this staff. As Casper’s assistant, Tom Fuentes … worked diligently to convince Republicans that Caspers was not what many party regulars feared, an unscrupulous opportunist who had no permanent loyalty to any political party. Fuentes was aided in his duties by the ubiquitous Frank Michelena. Michelena, a lobbyist with a checkered career, was notorious in the field of political influence. (Agents' Orange, 2000)

     Rogers obviously has a low regard of Mr. Michelena—and, I think, of Mr. Fuentes.
     At one point, he identifies three (roughly defined) eras of “machine” politics in Orange County.
     The first, which arose in the 60s, was dominated by Democrats and involved O’Neill, Cella (a nominal Republican), and Fred Harber, among others. But that machine slowly transformed into a “hybrid” that embraced both Democrats (like Harber and Robert Battin) and Republicans (like Caspers and Schmit). In this second “machine,” says Rogers, the “emphasis shifted from political philosophy to corporate profits.”
     Rogers identifies Ron Caspers, Tom Fuentes, and Frank Michelena as central to this disturbing political contraption.
     (According to R, there’s a third machine that Rogers associates with the “Cave Men”: a group of religious right Republicans who are focused on defending incumbents who share their right-wing philosophy. Dana Rohrabacher and Curt Pringle [the latter a close associate of Tom Fuentes], he says, are key to this third “machine.”)

* * *

Tom

     So there we have it. First, Pam Zanelli was part of Dr. Louis Cella's operation, at least in the narrow business sense, back in 1974. It is possible, I suppose, that she "didn't know what Cella was doing." But it is highly unlikely, I think.
     Zanelli was not new to politics at the time. In 1975, she was among 15 women chosen to serve on the Orange County Commission on the Status of Women.
     Second, she worked under Paul Carpenter, though I don't know when. Already in 1969, Carpenter was one of Dick and Doc's soldiers, and perhaps that suggests that Zanelli worked for Carpenter during the same era in which she worked for Cella. (Carpenter was based in Cypress, as was Fred Harber, who had been the City Manager.)
     Carpenter was dirty. According to Rogers, he played a part in the stunning shenanigans that caused Alton Allen's loss of his Supervisorial seat. It is reasonable to suppose that he participated in similar activities in subsequent years, the years of the rise of Cella and O'Neill's influence (which peaked at about 1975). 
     At any rate, by the 80s, Carpenter, always a sly character, was caught selling votes in Sacramento. When he died in 2002, the Times described his spectacular fall as a public servant:

     ...[H]is maverick behavior led to trouble in 1986 when, during his successful campaign for the Board of Equalization, he became a target of an FBI sting in which federal agents surreptitiously contributed money to lawmakers in exchange for legislative favors.
     Convicted in 1990 of racketeering, extortion and conspiracy for accepting $20,000 from a fictitious shrimp fishery, Carpenter got off on a technicality when a federal appeals court ruled that the jury had not been properly instructed. But he was forced to leave public office.
     In a separate case three years later, a jury convicted him on 11 counts of obstruction of justice and money laundering....
     "I was arrogant," Carpenter admitted to a Times reporter in 1993 during the trial, in which he was accused of illegally funneling $78,000 to [Sen. Alan] Robbins through a Santa Monica public relations firm.
     Shortly before he was to be sentenced, Carpenter fled to Costa Rica, saying he was seeking "a more adventuristic" treatment for the prostate cancer that doctors had predicted would kill him within two years. He wrote in a note to the judge: "I find my drive for survival stronger than my sense of obligation to your legal system."
     His drive for survival didn't keep him and a friend from entering—and winning—a national bridge tournament in the Central American nation.
     Tracked down less than a year later by U.S. officials, Carpenter spent several months in a Costa Rican jail before being returned to California for sentencing.
With his cancer in remission, Carpenter was sentenced in 1995 to seven years in federal prison. After his release from prison in 1999, Carpenter settled in seclusion in San Antonio ... in 1986.

     It is possible, of course, that Zanelli worked for this guy and had no idea that he was mighty hinky.
    Yeah. She's either clueless or hinky. Take your pick.
    Third—and least compelling, I suppose—she seemed to know and work with Frank Michelena, who was part of the highly Nixonian Team Caspers along with Fuentes and Harber. That's worth mentioning, I guess. Or maybe not.
     Ah, the SOCCCD saga! It just gets better and better, doesn't it?

[Note to self: among those who gave to Alton Allen during the 1970 campaign: Donald Bren, assistant to Allen, John Killefer, Frank Michelena--$500 each. Raub Bein Frost: $350. Beckman, Segerstrom, and Graham gave $250. Among Supe. Baker's contributors were Bren and Michelena.  Zitnik gave to Wilcoxen. Times, 7/8/70. Looks like Michelena soon switched horses to Caspers. Derek McWhinney gaver to Caspers in 1970! Oddly, so did Old Guard's Athalie Clark.]


UPDATE: PAM'S HUBBY, JEFF

     At some point, Pam married one Jeff Zanelli—presumably by 1975, since she was using his name by then. They later divorced, but I don’t know when.
     Jeff Zanelli was/is in the same business—political consulting. His name comes up in Democratic politics starting in the early 60s.
     Jeff, like Pam, was in some sense employed by Dr. Louis Cella. According to a 1975 Times article about Louis Cella’s criminal trial(s) (“Subpoena Quashed in Investigation of Cella,” Dec. 9, 1975),

     The federal grand jury is investigating alleged federal income tax evasion by Cella and two hospitals in which he is a major owner…. ¶ Cella … allegedly obtained money from the two hospitals by causing checks to be issued on the basis of phony invoices for nonexistent supply orders. ¶ He allegedly also caused the hospitals to pay some of the political campaign costs and some persons who worked on campaigns.
     Testifying before the federal grand jury Monday were Jerry Zanelli, staff director of the State Senate Democratic Caucus and administrative aide to Sen. David Roberti (D-Hollywood). Hospital sources said Zanelli has been paid more than $20,000 by the two hospitals.

     In 1982, Zanelli was still working for Roberti. In a Times article about the dishonest tactics routinely employed by the Newport Beach consulting firm Butcher-Forde, we’re told that Roberti sent his man Zanelli to help with the mailers for two other Democratic candidates, including State Sen. Alex Garcia, who sent mailers that falsely claimed a big endorsement, and Al Serrato, who sent mailers that were arguably racist :

     …[T]here is a continuing dispute involving mailers sent out by the campaign of Al Serrato, an unsuccessful Democratic candidate for the new 32nd Senate District seat in Orange County. ¶ The mailers said that one of Serrato’s opponents “marched with Vietnamese in black pajamas,” had a “Vietnamese businessman” as a chief financial supporter, and considered “Indochinese refugees” a major campaign issue. … ¶ After the Orange County Democratic Party’s ethics committee had “condemned” the mailing as “blatantly racist,” Serrato publicly insisted that he did not authorize some of the language it contained. But [Arnold] Forde, of Butcher-Forde, responded that Serrato had “designed the piece himself” and that the firm had only handled its distribution.
     Later, a variety of sources suggested that Jerry Zanelli, an aide ordered by Roberti to assist both the Garcia and Serrato campaigns, was responsible. ¶ …Zanelli said that while he had provided the money for the piece in question and had been in touch with Forde about distribution, he had never so much as looked at the contents. (“Dirty Campaign Tactics Creating Alarm,” LA Times, Jun 14, 1982)

     Of course.

     You’ll recall that “Dick and Doc’s” (i.e., Richard O'Neill and Dr. Louis Cella's) political strategist, Fred Harber, was very close with Butcher-Forde and that Forde worked on Ron Caspers’ first political campaign (in 1970). Tom Fuentes managed that campaign. Later, Fuentes became Caspers’ chief aide and no doubt had many dealings with Harber, Butcher, and Forde.

Shooting Star, part 11: mob connections, an unexplained murder

The entire “Fuentes/Shooting Star” saga can be found here.

      For those of you with the patience, I have more background on the “Shooting Star” story. You’ll recall that the yacht, Shooting Star, disappeared off the coast of Baja California in June of 1974, taking ten men with her, including Orange County Supervisor (5th District) Ron Caspers and political consultant Fred Harber. Harber was a key strategist for Dr. Louis Cella and his “shadow government” (to use OC DA Cecil Hicks’ phrase), which included in its stable four Supes, including Caspers. Caspers’ “executive aide” at the time of the Shooting Star incident was Tom Fuentes, who, it is often reported, decided to pass on the trip at the last minute, but not before he packed an extra ice chest for his boss filled with hors d’oeuvres and drinks.

      In my last post, we learned (based on the account of one-time OC GOP chair Tom Rogers) that Caspers, a Republican banker, engaged in foul deceptions to tarnish the reputation of 5th District Supervisor Alton Allen, whose office he evidently coveted.

      Below are excerpts from two articles from the January, 1976, edition of The California Journal. The first, by Dan Walters and his partner, describes Dr. Cella’s relationship to former Buena Park Mayor Fred Harber. Here, Harber emerges as a more interesting, and perhaps important, figure (at the time of the Shooting Star disappearance, he was 55 to Caspers’ 43 years of age).

      We also learn that Cella, (OC land baron) Richard O’Neill, and Harber partnered with a man tied to the mob.

      The next article, written by Nancy Boyarsky, briefly discusses Dr. Cella’s background. These details are pretty interesting.

      The last pair of articles, from the LA Times, have no very clear relationship to the Shooting Star/Cella saga. They concern the mysterious 1994 murder of a much-beloved woman who had worked as an assistant to many of the characters who have cropped up on these pages. Arlene Hoffman was slain, evidently, with an arrow from a cross-bow, in her Laguna Niguel home. The murderer took the arrow with him.
      Her murder has never been solved.

      She was once Fred Harber’s secretary at one of Louis Cella's hospitals. She had also worked for "Big Daddy" Jess Unruh and Norton Simon. At the time of her death in 1995, she had just been hired by new OC Supervisor Jim Silva.

The Tangled Web: Two

Unscrambling Dick and Doc’s financial and political empire

By Al Downer and Dan Walters

. . .

Mysterious figure [Dr. Louis Cella]

      Cella, whose business interests range from ranching to real estate but are concentrated in the medical field, is the mystery man of Orange County politics. Rumors about him and his political and business deals abound, but most of them evaporate under scrutiny.

      Cella operated behind-the-scenes until 1974, when he lost his front man, Fred Harber, who had been Cella’s chief political aide and sometimes business associate until his disappearance in June 1974. He and nine other persons, including Orange County Supervisor Ronald Caspers, vanished when Harber’s boat apparently sank off the coast of Baja California. Caspers was a member of the Cella-ONeill stable and his family savings-and-loan company had provided at least some of the financing for Cella’s chain of hospitals. “Harber was smooth, and as long as he was around things operated quietly with no fuss and muss,” says a knowledgeable Orange County observer. Harber operated out of one wing of the Cella clinic across the street from the county courthouse and once was on the payroll as an assistant to Supervisor Robert Battin, another organization politician who is now under indictment for using his staff in a political campaign.

      [State Controller Ken] Cory has described Harber as “a very good friend of mine, perhaps the best friend I have had.” And with good reason. Harber not only was the tactician for Cory’s early political successes, but he loaned Cory’s small insurance agency, Cornet Insurance Counselors, $95,250 in 1967 when the agency appeared to be having difficulty making payments on a note.

      Harber and Carl D’Agostino, now Cory’s deputy controller, were the co-founders of Demographic Communications Consultants, a campaign-management firm that has handled many campaigns for the Cella-ONeill organization. With Harber’s passing, Cella was forced to move into the open, and investigators began taking an interest in his complex of business affairs. Orange County District Attorney Cecil Hicks, perhaps the only major Orange County official openly hostile to Cella and O’Neill, has called Cella the man behind “a shadow government”. Cella hired a private investigator, through one of the hospitals, to investigate arch-enemy Hicks.

. . .

More ties 

      The influence of Cella and O’Neill in county government is apparent in many ways. A prime example is the El Toro case.

      El Toro Land Company was formed as a partnership in 1970 to develop a 39-acre parcel along the San Diego Freeway in Orange County. One of the original partners, with a $25,000 investment, was Albert Parvin, one-time Las Vegas casino-owner and head of the Parvin-Dohrmann Company and the Parvin Foundation. Meyer Lansky, reputed Mafia financial brain, was one of Parvin’s partners in the Flamingo Hotel and the Parvin Foundation had former Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas on its payroll for $12,000 per year – a revelation that sparked an impeachment effort against Douglas several years ago.

      Cella, O’Neill and Harber bought into El Toro Land in 1971 and remain as major partners, along with Parvin, according to corporate records. Shortly after they bought in, the Orange County Board of Supervisors took emergency action to establish a freeway interchange adjacent to that property and the land increased in value by 600 percent, county records show.

      As Cella and O’Neill were expanding their business and political empires, Cory was experiencing a growth of personal wealth and political influence. Cory, who attended four colleges and graduated from none, became involved in politics while still a teen-ager. He went to Sacramento in the early1960s as an aide to then-Assemblyman Richard Hanna, the first Democrat to achieve major office in Orange County in recent years, and Cory served on the staff of the Assembly Education Committee, which was chaired by Hanna.

. . .

The Tangled Web: Three

Richard O’Neill—last of the big spenders?

By Nancy Boyarsky

. . .

An enigma 

      The 51-year-old physician [Lou Cella] is something of an enigma. Two popular exercises in Orange County political circles are estimating the size of his wealth and speculating on its source. The estimates on size range from $50 million to $500 million, although he generally is regarded as being less wealthy than O’Neill. Even his closest business associates, including O’Neill, don’t know the extent of Cella’s business interests. And Cella’s own explanations elude verification. It is known that he came to Orange County about 20 years ago from Providence, Rhode Island, where his father was also a physician and political figure. But the elder Cella left an estate of less than a quarter-million dollars. Cella came to Orange County after losing a position as senior resident surgeon at Rhode Island Hospital. The hospital’s staff had given him a vote of “no confidence”. Cella had been expelled from one medical school for cheating and eventually graduated from another. Although he has maintained a small private practice in Santa Ana, Cella’s chief occupation in California has been that of businessman and political operative. He is involved in at least seven Orange County hospitals and has wide real-estate and other investments. The Internal Revenue Service says, however, that Cella hasn’t filed an income tax return for the past three years.

Arlene Hoffman

Who Killed Arlene Hoffman?

January 27, 1995 - NANCY WRIDE

. . .

      …From 1972 to 1974, she worked as a secretary for a political consulting firm called Fred Harber and Associates.

. . .

      "She spent everything they had trying to prolong his life," said Lyle Overby [you'll recall that he was on the Shooting Star but disembarked at Cabo], a political consultant and friend of 20 years whose admiration for Arlene Hoffman led him to recommend her to Silva….

One Year Later, Strange Slaying Still Unsolved : Inquiry: Whoever killed Arlene Hoffman with a hunting-type arrow left few clues. The Laguna Niguel widow was a longtime political aide and moved in high-profile circles.

December 30, 1995

NANCY WRIDE - TIMES STAFF WRITER

LAGUNA NIGUEL — Portions of drywall were hacked away from her condo in a futile hunt for clues. Detectives asked childhood friends and family to undergo fingerprinting and lie detector tests to narrow the field of suspects. Her son even offered a $25,000 reward from his inheritance for details leading to the conviction of the killer.

      But, one year later, the mystery remains unsolved as to who fired a hunting-type arrow through the chest of Arlene Hoffman, leaving her to bleed to death on the marble floor of her Laguna Niguel foyer.

      Hoffman, 57, widowed nine months earlier, was long active in the backfield of Southern California political campaigns. Shortly before she was found slain Dec. 30, 1994, she had been hired as personal secretary to Jim Silva, newly elected to the Orange County Board of Supervisors.

. . .

      Simply put, there was little if any physical evidence at the scene to trace back to Hoffman's killer—no shell casings or fingerprints, no permits or licensing required to buy or use an arrow, no weapon left behind….

*

      In her lifetime, Hoffman moved in some high-profile circles. In the 1970s, she was connected to some of the major stories and players of the day.

      She worked for the late millionaire industrialist and world-class art collector Norton Simon, up to and including his failed campaign for U.S. Senate in 1970. She was involved in other political campaigns, including former Assembly Speaker Jesse M. Unruh's unsuccessful 1973 bid to become mayor of Los Angeles. She was secretary to Fred Harber, a political consultant who vanished at sea off the coast of Baja California in June 1974.

      In 1976, she was called to testify as a witness before the Orange County Grand Jury investigating political corruption.

      Hoffman told the grand jury she was an employee of the hospital run by Dr. Louis Cella, a political kingmaker and largest campaign contributor in California at the time. Now dead [sic], Cella was accused of billing Medi-Cal for nonexistent patients, then funneling the money into the campaigns of numerous candidates who went on to hold major office. He ultimately was convicted of income-tax evasion, Medicare and Medi-Cal fraud, embezzlement and conspiracy. He spent 31 months in federal prison.

      Investigators believed Hoffman was on the payroll of a state-funded hospital but was actually working on political projects at Cella's behest—such as mimeographing campaign hit mailers out of the hospital's print shop. District attorney investigators say now that they believe she lied to protect her employers. Cella ran the first campaign of former Orange County Treasurer-Tax Collector Robert L. Citron, who has pleaded guilty for his role in the county's bankruptcy.

      Because Hoffman's slaying occurred in the high-anxiety days after the nation's largest municipal bankruptcy, the case has seemed ripe for speculation about a political connection. But beyond smoky rumor, investigators say, no such link between Hoffman's death and the bankruptcy has crystallized.

*

      By nightfall on Dec. 30, 1994, there was no call from Hoffman's cellular phone, no sign of her Mercedes-Benz in the county government parking lot. Supervisor Silva, whose entire family had become quite fond of Hoffman, grew worried and personally called Sheriff Brad Gates to have deputies check his secretary's condo. They found her dead in her hallway, the victim of an arrow possibly fired from a crossbow. An autopsy placed her death sometime during a 12-hour period between 7:30 p.m. Dec. 29 and 7:30 the following morning.

      Detectives have not recovered the arrow—which might have passed through her body or been removed from it by the killer. Her dog was skittering around the entryway, its bark surgically squelched by a previous owner. The front door was unlocked and there was no sign of a break-in.

      Inside her garage was her Mercedes and her cellular phone. Nothing of any value appeared missing from the house. Partial fingerprints taken from a stairway from which investigators suspect the killer fired the arrow down on Hoffman didn't lead to an arrest.

      Archery shops and sporting good stores in the region were questioned for leads.

      "They've interviewed everyone who ever had contact with her or might have had contact with her," Wilkerson said, "and any place she might have frequented, employees."

      Her relatives declined to discuss the case, requesting privacy in their grief. Her son, Charles Anthony Hoffman, 26, who was talkative July 12, 1994, when he announced the reward for information leading to the conviction of his mother's killer, did not return phone calls….

      No creditors emerged, court records show. There were not even any claims stemming from the personal bankruptcy she and her late husband, Joel, filed and had resolved two weeks before his death in March 1994 after battling cancer.

      Hoffman leased her condo from her sister and brother-in-law, Joanne and John Dougherty, who friends say wanted her close to them in Dana Point.

      The condo was sealed off for several months during evidence gathering. Then came cleanup and repairs totaling $12,000 from damage caused by the slaying and police investigation.

      Wilkerson said Hoffman's son eventually made the condo his home—at least for several months after that.

      At the time he offered the $25,000 reward, Charles Hoffman said he hoped it would lead to an arrest and some "closure" for his family, which had suffered two deaths within a year.

      In the year since her death, though, there has been no closure.

      The Sheriff's Department has not received any calls responding to the reward, Wilkerson said, and they have no fresh clues.

      The family still grieves.

      And everyone still wonders why someone would kill Arlene Hoffman.

SEE That wasn't Caspers' first sinking

Shooting Star, part 10: the "grand scheme of patronage"

The entire “Fuentes/Shooting Star” saga can be found here.

El Toro Road, 1970

Ronald Caspers

            This series of posts has focused on the 1974 disappearance of the Shooting Star and the political corruption and misdeeds that served as that tragedy's backdrop. Recently, I acquired a copy of Agents’ Orange, a history of recent Orange County politics by former OC GOP chair Tom Rogers, who, starting in the 80s, emerged as a leader in the fight against developers and the Supervisors they “owned.”

            Here’s Rogers' discussion of Ronald Caspers, who perished in the 1974 disaster and who, it seems, was a pretty nasty piece of work:

            [TAKING OUT ALTON ALLEN.] The incumbent in the 5^th district was [Republican] Alton Allen [born: 1897], a retired banker, who lived in the charming village of Laguna Beach….

            Allen was widely respected for his representation of the 5^th District, which included the beach communities of Newport, Balboa, Laguna, and San Clemente, plus the vast inland areas held by the Irvine Ranch and the Rancho Mission Viejo, with thousands of acres devoted to agricultural production.

Alton Allen

            It came as a rude shock when, in 1969, a tabloid-type mailer was received by residents of the 5th District alleging wrongdoing on the part of Allen and his staff. Allen’s reputation for honesty and integrity had been undoubted, never a whisper against his character had ever been heard. Campaign finance reporting requirements were almost nonexistent in those days, so it was impossible to determine who was behind this puzzling attack, which was to develop into a recall movement. Anthony Tarantino, one of the nominal sponsors of the mailer, … was a man of modest means and it was obvious that there was someone else, unidentified, who was engaged in the expensive campaign to destroy Alton Allen’s character.

            Allen contacted Republican leadership for help against this scurrilous attack. At a meeting at the Balboa Bay Club, GOP leaders met with Allen and those in attendance were at a loss for any explanation of the anti-Allen campaign. The retired banker was obviously distraught at having unfounded insinuations directed at himself and his staff. There was some speculation tentatively expressed. Organized crime? Democrats taking over a neglected facet of Orange County politics? ….

            [NEXT: RECALL.] The mysterious anti-Allen forces opened a headquarters in Laguna Hills from which to launch a formal recall campaign. The mailers kept arriving with insinuations of Allen’s “wrongdoing.” Staff at the recall headquarters refused any information to the press that had become interested in the plot. The Alton Allen recall petition failed to obtain sufficient signatures and it is doubtful that the exercise was anything other than to prepare the way for the upcoming supervisorial election in the 5th District. Alton Allen’s campaign for reelection was close at hand.

Paul Carpenter

            [CELLA AND HARBER.] It would be revealed later that Tarantino had ties to [corruption kingpin] Lou Cella, [Shooting Star owner] Fred Harber, and others identified by [corrupt Supervisor] Robert Battin as “the Coalition.” Battin, in an attempt to depict his own conviction as discriminatory, revealed the existence of the group, which also included [OC land baron] R.J. O’Neill.

            Tarantino’s connection was that as a cabinet-maker he had worked for Cella and become friends with both him and Fred Harber. It was at their request that he agreed to lend his name to the Allen recall. Tarantino was also on the payroll of the Mission Viejo Hospital at $800 per month, until the law caught up with Cella.

            The original plan to recall Allen was scrubbed when it was decided that if Allen were recalled, Governor Reagan would probably appoint his assistant John Killifer, who was in no way connected to the scheme….

            [THE "SHADOW GOVERNMENT"* VS. ALLEN.] Robert Battin was to use his position on the Board of Supervisors to make Allen look inept in dealing with certain issues. [Local politician and (ultimately) convicted felon] Paul Carpenter also admitted to being part of the recall effort much later, but denied knowledge of the other Coalition members being involved. Carpenter claimed that the clandestine effort was confined to himself and a Republican who aspired to be a supervisor.

            [RON CASPERS EMERGES.] Emerging out of the shadows was Ron Caspers, a Republican who was the owner of Keystone Savings and Loan in Westminster. In the beginning there were suspicions expressed that he was the moving force behind Allen’s recall, a charge he denied but which was later confirmed in the course of several unrelated criminal prosecutions.

Robert Battin

            [AN EARLIER BOATING DISASTER.] Caspers had made headlines prior to the Allen affair. He and his wife Beatrice had been cruising in coastal waters south of Port Hueneme in the ketch Aloha on the night of October 1, 1954. With Caspers at the helm, the Aloha veered in front of an oncoming Coast Guard cutter. The Aloha sank and the remains of Beatrice Caspers were never found, despite an intensive search by Coast Guard vessels and aircraft. An investigation by the U.S. Coast Guard of this tragedy at sea never resulted in any criminal proceedings.

            Allen’s reelection campaign received no help from the GOP, and his campaign staff were amateurs, at best. Alton never recovered from the personal attacks and he went down to defeat.

            Casper had made his conservative Republican credentials a key part of the contest, although investigation turned up the fact that he had been a sponsor of and signatory to a “Republican for Alan Cranston” newspaper political advertisement. [Cranston’s political career was later destroyed by his involvement in the Keating Five scandal.]

. . .

            [CASPERS, THE COALITION, AND “SHAKEDOWN” RUMORS.] With Caspers’ election, Orange County politics were turned upside down. It was the dawning of a new era, and whether Caspers was a Republican or a Democrat, the special interests flocked to his office confident that they had a supervisor with whom they could do “business.”

            The fact he claimed to be a Republican had little to do with the support he received from the Coalition. That group supported other Republicans including Larry Schmit for supervisor.

            Caspers is rumored to have indicated that important county appointments, such as the Planning Commission, would cost an applicant $15,000.

            [ENTER YOUNG TOM FUENTES.] Caspers hired a young graduate of Chapman College who had helped in his campaign to serve on this staff. As Casper’s assistant, Tom Fuentes [born: 1949] (who would become prominent in Republican circles later on) worked diligently to convince Republicans that Caspers was not what many party regulars feared, an unscrupulous opportunist who had no permanent loyalty to any political party. Fuentes was aided in his duties by the ubiquitous Frank Michelena. Michelena, a lobbyist with a checkered career, was notorious in the field of political influence. [“Checkered” is an understatement.]

            If there were ever any doubts regarding Casper’s ties to the Democratic Party, they were soon dispelled. It was discovered later that Caspers had a business arrangement with [Democrat] Ken Cory through a company called Anaheim Insurance Agency. It was out of the office of this company that Democrats operated their registration efforts in Orange County. Assemblyman Cory was to be the subject of a criminal investigation concerning the no bid purchase of insurance by the City of Carson in Los Angles County. Although several Carson City Councilmen were involved, Cory was never indicted.

Ken Cory

            In this election, it appears that the candidate preceded the special interests, and it was after his election that Caspers made the contacts and set the ground rules for developer participation in the grand scheme of patronage carried to an exponential degree.

            [ORGANIZED CRIME?] In a later criminal case, a paid informant with reputed ties to organized crime would allege that Caspers had received a $600,000 loan from two banks, Coast and U.S. National. The informant, Gene Conrad, had been working with the district attorney’s office in an attempt to connect the Board of Supervisors to the syndicate. Conrad’s testimony did not bear out the suspicion of the D.A. that supervisors had been provided with interest-free loans from gambling interests. Conrad stated that his research had determined that the loan in question did carry interest. Whether it was ever paid back remains a mystery.

. . .

Leisure World, 1974

            Casper’s career was cut short on June 14, 1974, when he disappeared at sea aboard the Shooting Star owned by Fred Harber. Caspers and his two sons were returning from a trip to Cabo San Lucas in Baja California when Harber’s converted … rescue craft was overtaken by a violent storm. After sending out a mayday signal on January 13, the vessel was never heard from again, and all of the occupants were presumed dead, lost at sea.            

            [FUENTES AND OVERBY DODGE A BULLET.] Tom Fuentes, who was scheduled to go on the trip, backed out at the last minute, and was saved from a similar fate. Another county luminary who backed out of the ill-fated trip at the last minute was Lyle Overby.

            Despite a full-scale search operation directed by Fuentes that included the use of commercial swordfishing “spotter planes,” no trace of the craft of its passengers was ever found.

SEE Part 11

*OC DA Cecil Hicks' phrase (referring to Louis Cella, et al.)

Shooting Star, part 9: straight-shooting conservative Tom Rogers on Caspers, Harber, and what they portended

The entire “Fuentes/Shooting Star” saga can be found here.

Tom Rogers (1924-2006), OC GOP chair, 1969-1972

             (For parts 1-8, go here.)
             TALK TO TOM ROGERS. The other night, I spoke with an old acquaintance who’s been active in mostly Democratic politics in Orange County going back at least thirty years. I mentioned to him that I was researching the sinking of the “Shooting Star.” He immediately knew what I was referring to.

            “You need to talk to Tom Rogers,” he said. “He’s the guy who knows.”

            “Yeah? Is he still alive?” I asked.

            “Don’t know.”

            When I got home, I did a little research. Tom Rogers was an interesting guy. He grew up in LA County, served with distinction during WW II, went to college on the GI Bill, got married, and, by the early 60s, owned a ranch in south Orange County.

Tom Riley, developers' friend

            That’s when he got into politics. Rogers was decidedly right-wing—he was an early supporter of the notorious John Schmitz. But he was also the kind of now-rare conservative who was into “conserving” things, especially the rural life of OC that still existed in the 60s and that now exists only in the canyons of the Santa Ana Mountains (where the Reb and I live). 
            He was a leader: he served as the Chair of the local GOP from 1969 to1972 and then served as a state GOP big shot during Reagan’s gubernatorial years (see).

            But things changed. Especially after Ron Caspers was replaced with Reagan appointee Thomas Riley—that fellow was the answer to developers’ dreams—Rogers settled into a slow-growth philosophy that directly opposed the “rapid development” direction of the Board of Supervisors and their Big Money patrons. Hell, in his efforts to oppose the developers and their Supervisors, he even embraced bipartisanship.

            The story is told in a 1996 article by Nathan Callahan: Tobacco Road: Tom Rogers & the Philip Morris Tollway.

            I’ve gotta say: Tom Rogers may have been a conservative Republican, but he was a cool guy. Read the article and see why. It comes as no surprise that the left-wing Callahan declared Rogers to be “my favorite Orange County Republican.”

            According to my friend (who is a close associate of Callahan's), Rogers always thought that the sinking of the Shooting Star was seriously hinky. The whole business soured him on the OC GOP. Or so the friend said.

* * *

Ron Caspers

            CALLING MRS. ROGERS. I looked Rogers up. I managed to find a phone number, called it. His wife, who seems to have a European accent, answered the phone.

            I said: “Hello, is Mr. Tom Rogers there?”

            “My husband died six years ago. In fact the date of his death is a month away: April 16. Why are you calling?”

            “I’m writing an article about the sinking of the Shooting Star in 1974.”

            “Oh, Ron Caspers?”

            She told me that she wasn’t the one to talk to about that, that her husband had written about Caspers and the Shooting Star in his book.

            “Agents’ Orange?” I asked. That was the only book that Rogers seems to have written. It was published in 2000.

            She then recited the whole title: “Agents’ Orange: the unabridged political history of Orange County 1960-2000.”

            “We stopped printing it,” she said. “But we made the book available to local libraries.”

            I told her that I had already located a copy at the Santa Ana Public Library and that I would probably be reading it tomorrow.

            “Sorry to bother you,” I said.

            “It’s no bother. I’m glad that people are still interested in those things.”

            I’m not entirely sure what she meant by “those things,” but I'll take whatever encouragement I can get.

Irvine Heritage Library: "lost"

            LIBRARY SNIPE HUNT. Yesterday, I finished my last class and got back to my office. I Googled “Agents’ Orange.” I found that the book was supposed to be available just down the street, at the Irvine Heritage Park Library. So I zipped over there, found the book’s call numbers, and headed for the stacks.
            Couldn’t find it.

            I asked a librarian for help, and that sent her into a fury of searching and conferring and whatnot. After about twenty minutes, she acknowledged that the book was “lost.” That’s an official category, evidently. 

            While at the Irvine Heritage, I found that the book was supposed to be available also at the San Juan Capistrano Library, and so I headed down the 5. Fifteen minutes later, I entered the smallish building, just behind the Mission, and headed for the reference section. 
            Couldn’t find the book.

San Juan Capistrano Library: "lost"

            Talked to a librarian. She informed me that the book was in the “California Collection,” which, as it happened, was immediately behind me. Aha! She walked over and looked for it. 
            Couldn't find the book. 
            That sent her into search and confer mode, and, at the end of that process she declared that the book was “lost.”

            Gosh, what are the chances?

            I headed home and called the Santa Ana Public Library, which was also supposed to have a copy, but their copy was in the “Local History” room, which is only open from Tuesdays through Thursdays. (It was Monday.) Dang! So I planned to go there the next day.

            Feeling lucky, I did a quick search at Irvine Valley College Library, and, guess what? They supposedly had a copy, too, and it was “available”! Skeptical, I called up the IVC Library and spoke with some guy who went in search of the book. After about fifteen minutes, he declared, “Got it!”

IVC Library: "Got it!"

            TOM ROGERS' EXCELLENT ADVENTURE. So, today, I picked up the book. Just now, I got a chance to give it a quick once over. It appears to be excellent. It is a marvelous book that seems to have been almost entirely ignored for the last dozen years. Near as I could tell, it had never been checked out at any of those libraries.

            I’ll have more soon, but, for now, I'll start off with some quotations that provide a sense of Rogers' theses.
            This is from Rogers’ “Introduction.” According to Rogers’ "unabridged" OC History, starting in the 1970s,

the driving forces behind those who would gain political control of Orange County were motivated by the pursuit of corporate profits, and party affiliation was simply a matter of convenience rather than conviction.
. . .
        The most devastating result of dollar politics was that Republicans and Democrats abandoned their core party principles. The temptation was just too strong to win elections with the unlimited funds available to those who passed the litmus test. The special interests were soon able to control the county and some cities when computer technology replaced motivated volunteers as a decisive force in winning elections.

El Toro Road (in Caspers' district), 1970

             THE "CAVE MEN." Eventually, according to Rogers,

a relatively small group of Republican incumbents began to exert influence at the state level, by pre selecting candidates for State Assembly and Senate. The criteria for their selection process was a willingness … to accept and embrace the incumbents’ view of what constitutes a “proper” conservative. Once they passed this Biblical/Philosophical vetting, those Republicans who made the cut would have the assurance of sizeable donations plus professional management of their campaigns. This all-knowing, all-powerful group became known as “The Cave Men” [elsewhere, Rogers notes that the term is non-pejorative], who by virtue of being incumbents had the capability of extracting money from lobbyists in Sacramento, a literal bonanza for all ambitious politicians…. Whether it was the financial support of the special interests or of the GOP incumbents, the net result was that in many cases individuals were elected to an office for which they were totally unqualified.

Tom and wife at Supervisor Riley's annual BBQ, c. mid-80s

             THE COALITION. In one section of his book, Rogers provides a chronological sketch of the events covered in his book. Things don’t really start popping until 1970:

1970   Mysterious newcomer runs a behind-the-scenes campaign to gain election to the Board of Supervisors. Ron Caspers is elected in the 5th District, changing the direction of politics in Orange County. Ralph Clark is also elected to the board making a third vote for the emerging special interests. This new group of wealthy individuals is called The Coalition, and they begin to exert power in Orange County. [Rogers later states that the “Coalition” comes to an end in 1978 with the indictment of Louis Cella, Richard O'Neill's partner in achieving political influence.]

Dr. Louis Cella

            Despite their brief tenure, Caspers and Co. loom large in Rogers’ remarkable account of OC political corruption: “…[M]any blame [Caspers] for the descent of Orange County into the world of political intrigue, campaign finance abuses, and influence peddling” (p. 154).

            CASPERS AND HARBER: SHAKEDOWN. Elsewhere, Rogers discusses “Shooting Star” owner, Fred Harber (you’ll recall that Harber was among the ten victims of the Shooting Star disaster that also took Caspers' life), who, according to Rogers, engaged in an activity “now called lobbying”:

     Harber had been considered a prime mover in county politics….   Prior to his disappearance, he was alleged to have been involved in a shakedown of a developer in behalf of Supervisor Caspers. The builder Richard V. Jordan, in a sworn statement, declared that Harber had contacted him after his project in Casper’s 5th District had been turned down, and had told him what it would take to solve the problem. “$10,000 and $2,000 per month” Harber is alleged to have demanded form Jordan…. 
     Jordan asserted in his deposition that the meeting with Harber was prior to meeting with Caspers in a rubber raft off Cabo San Lucas. Jordan was represented by attorney R.S. “Sam” Barnes and his client contacted District Attorney [and Cella foe] Cecil Hicks and arranged for a payoff with marked bills. [A sting!] Before the plan was put into motion, Caspers won reelection and, with Harber, boarded the Shooting Star and headed once again for the Cape…. [From there, the ship headed north and disappeared.]   In the end the county paid off $700,000 to Jordan’s company…, as a result of losses caused by the extortion scheme.

            In his 1984 article ("The Sinking of a Political Machine"), journalist Larry Peterson wondered if Harber and Caspers attempted this "shakedown" with others—others who, unlike Jordan, were disposed to respond with violence rather than litigation.
            Rogers’ account of the dirty tricks campaign waged in 1969 against Republican Supervisor Alton Allen is fascinating. As it turns out, Ron Caspers was behind that campaign. Caspers won the Supervisorial seat away from Allen in 1970, with Tom Fuentes’ help.

            One more thing: in his book's first reference to the "Shooting Star" disaster, Rogers writes: "Fred Harber's controversial career was cut short by what appeared to be a maritime accident" (151).
            "Appeared to be"?

—More to come—
SEE Part 10

OC Supervisor Alton Allen, 1969.
Essentially taken out by dirty trickster Ron Caspers.
Tom Fuentes was Caspers' right hand man