Moriarty Money Linked to Carson Council Campaign

Convicted political corrupter W. Patrick Moriarty secretly funneled $30,000 in laundered contributions into a campaign to elect a Carson City Council candidate who later supported his plan for a multimillion-dollar development on a contaminated dump site in the city, The Times has learned.

Moriarty secretly financed the successful campaign to help elect Vera Robles DeWitt, a friend and political ally of two incumbent Carson council members and the third vote in a pro-development bloc, according to public records and a Moriarty associate involved in the 1981 campaign.

Although Moriarty provided the money, the contributions were listed in campaign reports as coming from others. Moriarty’s involvement never surfaced publicly in the campaign in which an incumbent Carson councilman, one of Moriarty’s closest associates and two political consultants played significant roles.

3 Campaign Committees

The money fueled three campaign committees that sought to elect DeWitt, according to the consultant who organized them. The campaign primarily smeared DeWitt’s strongest opponent, while purporting it was to get out the vote and not to support a candidate.

State law makes it a crime to hide the source of political contributions. The law also requires that the true purpose of campaign committees be disclosed.

Moriarty, through his lawyer, Jan Lawrence Handzlik, declined comment.

DeWitt said she had no knowledge of Moriarty’s campaign activities on her behalf.

“I was very naive, and I didn’t know what the master plan was, if there was a master plan. . . . Somebody was running the show, and I wasn’t aware of it.”

After DeWitt’s election to the City Council in 1981, the three members of the political bloc consistently voted in favor of Moriarty’s plan to develop what could have been one of Carson’s most valuable undeveloped properties--a 160-acre landfill in central Carson beside the San Diego Freeway.

Moriarty was a general partner in a firm called Casa del Amo Estates, which held a long-term lease on the Carson property.

Revelations Kill Project

Moriarty’s plans for the property died after he became the central figure in a broad political corruption investigation. Since 1980, Moriarty has laundered at least $260,000 in contributions to politicians across the state, according to former Moriarty associates and public records.

Many of the contributions were in support of Moriarty’s fight for passage of a bill barring local governments from outlawing the sale of so-called safe-and-sane fireworks, the non-explosive type manufactured by Red Devil Fireworks Co., which Moriarty controlled. The bill passed but was subsequently vetoed by then-Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr.

Moriarty has pleaded guilty to seven counts of mail fraud, three stemming from charges that he participated in a scheme to give secret shares in the California Commerce Club to City of Commerce officials in connection with their granting a license for the gambling club. He was sentenced Jan. 31 to seven years in federal prison.

So far, 10 men have been indicted in the Moriarty investigation, which is focusing on political figures in Sacramento and Southern California.

Moriarty made his first contribution to the Carson campaign at a meeting in the lobby of the Hyatt Regency in downtown Los Angeles, according to participants in the meeting.

The meeting was arranged by Carson Councilman Walter J. (Jake) Egan and Richard Raymond Keith, then one of Moriarty’s closest associates and formerly his project manager in Carson.

4-Year Prison Sentence

Keith pleaded guilty in the Moriarty corruption investigation and is serving a four-year sentence in federal prison.

Egan said Keith had told him that Moriarty wanted to support DeWitt in the upcoming election. It was a critical election, Egan said, because it could change the balance of the council, which had been captured by a liberal majority the previous year.

Egan said he told Keith that they should hire Arthur Forcier, a part-time consultant and college instructor who had run DeWitt’s unsuccessful 1978 campaign for Carson city treasurer.

“Jake (Egan) told me he wanted me to meet some people and explain how we could use get-out-the-vote committees to elect Vera DeWitt,” Forcier said.

Egan said he arranged for Forcier to meet him, Keith and Moriarty at the Hyatt.

“Art’s purpose was to tell Moriarty what he (Forcier) could do and what it would cost,” Egan said.

At the conclusion of that meeting, Moriarty told Keith to give Forcier a $5,000 down payment on the campaign, Forcier said. Eventually, according to records and several Moriarty associates, at least $30,000 in contributions would be pumped into the effort.

‘Get Her Elected’

“Their bottom line was to get her (DeWitt) elected,” Egan said.

In the weeks that followed, political consultant Forcier and a consultant he hired, David J. Robinson, spent nearly twice as much money electing Moriarty’s favored candidate as was spent by the candidate’s own election committee, county records show.

During that time, Forcier received at least three more checks for the Moriarty-sponsored campaign, Forcier said.

“I knew Moriarty was the sponsor (of the campaign),” Forcier said.

Keith said he made the contributions, and Moriarty reimbursed him.

Copies of the checks provided by Keith show that:

- The first $5,000 check that Forcier received at the Hyatt was written on the account of a dummy company of Keith’s, Card Construction Co. Inc., that had no employees and used as its address a vacant lot in Irvine. The check, made out to Forcier, appears in campaign reports as a contribution from Keith’s firm, Card Construction.

- A second check for $10,000 was drawn on the same Keith company account and was made out to the Public Information and Education Committee, a campaign committee organized by Forcier to receive the contributions. The contribution appears in reports as being from from Card Construction.

- A third contribution for $5,000 was a cashier’s check made out to the Public Information and Education Committee. It showed up in campaign reports as a contribution from Charles Burden, a business associate of Keith’s.

- A final $10,000 contribution came as a cashier’s check made out to the Public Information and Education Committee. It showed up in campaign reports as a contribution from John E. Murphy, another Moriarty associate.

All the checks were issued on accounts at the Bank of Irvine, where Moriarty was a co-founder and officer.

The two cashier’s checks were purchased with a $15,000 check drawn on Card Construction Co., which had an account at the Bank of Irvine, according to copies of the checks provided by Keith. This check was made out to the Bank of Irvine and signed by Keith.

‘Was Moriarty’s Money’

“Every check in Carson was Moriarty’s money,” Keith said in an interview. Keith said Moriarty told him to use the other names on the checks to hide Moriarty’s involvement.

Except for the first check, Forcier said he got the checks in the mail and through Egan, the Carson councilman.

Egan denied that he was ever a conduit for Moriarty’s money. But he said that he did pass on envelopes for mailing the money from Forcier to Keith. “I gave the envelopes to Keith, and Keith mailed the checks to Forcier,” Egan said.

Egan also said he did not know the money was laundered. “I didn’t believe the money was laundered. My impression was that Moriarty contributed, but I don’t know the general makeup of who contributed because I never saw any of the checks.”

Forcier maintained he also did not know the funds were laundered. “I didn’t do anything illegal, and I didn’t know of anything illegal, and I’m not covering up for anything illegal. I had no idea that Moriarty was reimbursing anyone, absolutely none,” he said.

However, Forcier contradicted himself, saying on several occasions that he believed all the money “emanated” from Moriarty, Keith or Egan--even though it was listed in campaign reports as coming from Card Construction, Murphy and Burden.

The reports were prepared by Shirley Wechsler, Forcier’s wife and a longtime campaign committee treasurer who said her reports were based on information on the checks themselves. Wechsler did not play a role in the operation of the campaign, she said.

Pair Fined $2,000

Forcier and Wechsler frequently work together. Only a few months earlier, they ran a Ventura County Assembly race, later described by the Fair Political Practices Commission as a “classic deceptive mailing campaign.” The two admitted violating the state’s political reform act and were fined $2,000.

In the Carson campaign, Forcier used Moriarty’s contributions to create three committees that Forcier called “get-out-the-vote committees” and that publicly were not connected to the campaign of any candidate--even though Forcier, Keith and Egan all said the committees were created to help elect DeWitt.

Under state law, support for a candidate must be declared in campaign organization statements if the principal activities of a campaign committee are on behalf of a candidate.

“The game plan was to add Vera (DeWitt) to the City Council, and get a Kay-Vera-Egan majority,” Forcier said.

Councilwoman Kay Calas was a friend and political ally of DeWitt. As Egan put it, “They’re tight as the skin on a grape.”

At the time, Egan and the two women admittedly were a pro-development political bloc. Calas said she did not know anything about Moriarty’s campaign activities in Carson.

Egan denies he was a key figure in the Moriarty-backed campaign.

“I did not file, fill out (campaign statements) or set up any committees,” Egan said. “I don’t see how I can be considered a principal. . . . They’re trying to have a bridge game and deal me in for a fourth, but I’m not a principal.”

Egan does concede that he introduced Moriarty to consultant Forcier, provided demographics for the campaign, identified political issues for mailings, found office quarters for one of the committees, permitted the consultants to use his files and was one of the few people apprised of the campaign’s purpose. In addition, other key figures in the campaign--Forcier and Keith--cite Egan as a principal participant.

Funds Passed On

Forcier set up the Moriarty-sponsored campaign operation using a primary committee to receive the $30,000 in contributions. Most of that money was then passed on to two satellite committees, which produced and distributed the campaign literature.

This setup made it even more difficult to trace the source of the funds.

Forcier called his primary committee the Public Information and Education Committee. The satellites were called the Civic Action Committee and All Automatic Aids and were run by Robinson, the political consultant hired by Forcier.

The committees produced at least seven pieces of campaign literature based on political issues identified by Egan, according to Forcier and Egan. The material included a tabloid called The Muse Paper, which obliquely accused DeWitt’s strongest foe, Sylvia Muise, of extravagance with city money during an earlier term as a councilwoman.

The eight-page tabloid charged that Muise had the city buy her a $5,000 typewriter and that she went on expensive taxpayer-financed “junkets” to Japan, while cutting back funds for parks.

Another tabloid accused her of holding an “illegal fund-raiser” and failing to report large contributions from Carson industrial interests. The materials also attacked several other candidates and political figures and included several get-out-the-vote flyers, but they primarily smeared Muise.

Muise said the barrage of mailers contained false charges and inferences.

All the smear mailers disguised their source by listing only the address--a post office box--of the Moriarty-sponsored campaign committee that sent it. In records filed with the secretary of state, the committee that distributed the literature also used only a post office box as an address.

Full Address Required

A spokeswoman for the Fair Political Practices Commission said state law requires a full address on campaign statements filed with the secretary of state.

Robinson said he believed that he complied with the law when he sent out the mailings. He also said he was not aware that the money for his campaign came from Moriarty.

Forcier defended the disguised mailings saying that they were not “political” because they merely attacked DeWitt’s opponent without explicitly advocating DeWitt’s election.

“It wasn’t a direct promoter of Vera (DeWitt),” Forcier said. “It was an indirect promoter of Vera.”

Muise blames Moriarty’s expensive smear campaign as a major factor in her defeat.

“I knew there had to be megabucks out there, paying for all the smear literature,” Muise said, “but I was unaware of the funding source.

“It had a tremendous impact. My committee didn’t have the money to overcome their smear tactics.”

When the tally was completed after the election, DeWitt had beaten Muise by about 5% of the vote. They were the two top vote-getters in a field of six.

DeWitt said her subsequent votes in favor of Moriarty’s project had nothing to do with Moriarty helping her in the election. She said she was not even aware until six months ago that Moriarty had been involved in the 1981 race.

DeWitt said she never met Moriarty until 1983 and she has never met Keith.

“The way the scenario works, as I see it now, is that there may be a lot of these committees, pseudo-committees, that were set up to bring in money and to do this. . . . It may sound incredible or hard to believe--but that perhaps I didn’t know about these committees,” she said.

DeWitt also said Forcier never told her about Moriarty’s campaign efforts on her behalf--even though Forcier said he was a consultant to DeWitt’s own election committee at the same time that he was running the three Moriarty committees.

Another DeWitt consultant, Dan Healy, said Forcier laid out the election strategy and the timetable for DeWitt’s campaign.

But DeWitt denied Forcier played any role in her 1981 campaign.