5 More Suspects Named in Bingo Investigation : Former Anaheim Councilman Cited in Probe of Hawaiian Gardens Operation

The Los Angeles County district attorney’s office has filed a misdemeanor complaint against five men, including a former Anaheim councilman, suspected of illegally profiting from a multimillion-dollar charity bingo operation in Hawaiian Gardens that subsidizes an alcoholism rehabilitation center.

The complaint, filed Wednesday at Los Cerritos Municipal Court in Bellflower, comes on the heels of a 17-month district attorney’s probe of the bingo operation run by Cooper Fellowship Inc. of Santa Ana and follows the arrest of Cooper Fellowship’s executive director on suspicion of violating laws regulating bingo.

Others Named

W. J. (Bill) Thom, a two-term Anaheim councilman who retired in 1978, is suspected of receiving a salary from the bingo operation, according to the complaint.

Also named in the complaint were John Zeolla, operator of a North Hollywood marble firm; Tom D’Alessandro, a Santa Ana real estate agent, and Robert Ellis and Larry Hayden, employees of Cooper Fellowship. The complaint alleges the four men illegally received salaries and held financial interests in the bingo club.

Cooper Fellowship’s charity bingo operation in Hawaiian Gardens is believed to be among the most profitable bingo games in California. Recently the operation has grossed about $1.7 million a month, city officials said. Those funds are used to subsidize Cooper Fellowship’s Santa Ana center, which houses about 100 recovering alcoholics.

Deputy Dist. Atty. James Koller said an audit conducted by the state attorney general’s office in January was being used as “the backbone” of the current case against the men. The audit covered a 20-month period beginning in January, 1983.

The complaint against Thom stemmed from an audit report that said Cooper Fellowship paid him $10,400 for “community and public and professional services.” Thom represented Cooper Fellowship when the group applied for a business license in late 1983 to begin operating the bingo hall in Hawaiian Gardens.

The complaint against D’Alessandro, Zeolla, Ellis and Hayden stems from the nearly $200,000 in loans the audit report says the four men gave Cooper Fellowship to start the bingo operation.

Law enforcement officials say the loans, which in some cases were repaid at a 15% annual interest rate, gave the lenders a financial interest in the games, which is prohibited by state law.

Unaware of Purpose

Zeolla said Thursday in an interview that he was unaware that the $75,000 he loaned to Cooper Fellowship would be used to start a bingo operation.

“If I had known that, I wouldn’t have loaned the money,” he said. “I thought I was loaning to help an alcohol-rehabilitation center.”

Of the others, only Hayden was available for comment. He said he did not know that the district attorney had filed a complaint against him.

“This is the first I heard anything about it,” Hayden said during a brief telephone interview. “I have nothing to say.”

On Sept. 18 Jack Blackburn, executive director of the alcoholism rehabilitation center, was arrested on suspicion of violating state law by paying wages to himself and other employees from bingo proceeds, not staffing the games with volunteers and commingling profits from the bingo operation with other funds used to run Cooper Fellowship.

Although the five other men were not arrested, they will be required to surrender to authorities when they, along with Blackburn, are arraigned Oct. 10 at Los Cerritos Municipal Court, prosecutors said.

Violations of the bingo law carry penalties of fines up to $10,000 and six months in jail.