Donor Charged With Disguising Source of Funds

A Newport Beach man was charged Wednesday with laundering campaign contributions to two Orange County supervisors.

Anthony Michael Otting, 43, was charged with two misdemeanor counts of violating the state campaign contributions law for allegedly donating money to the supervisors without disclosing that the actual donor was a Massachusetts trash-hauling firm that employed him.

Otting donated $300 to Supervisor Thomas F. Riley and $250 to Supervisor Bruce Nestande, who is the GOP candidate for secretary of state.

“The supervisors have cooperated in the investigation, and there’s no evidence whatsoever that either supervisor had any knowledge that these were laundered contributions,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Kenneth O. Chinn, who is prosecuting the case.

It is a violation of California law to disguise the source of a campaign contribution. Each misdemeanor count carries a penalty of up to six months in jail and up to $10,000 in fines.

Otting made a donation to Riley on Sept. 26, 1985, and to Nestande on Nov. 8, 1985. At the time he made the contributions, Chinn said, Otting was working for the Santa Ana office of GSX Corp. of Boston, a trash-hauling firm that has bid for county contracts. Chinn said he did not know Otting’s position or whether he is still employed by GSX.

Although Otting was the only GSX employee charged Wednesday, the district attorney’s office last April began investigating a total of $1,500 in contributions from five GSX employees to the two supervisors.

The investigation was prompted by a complaint from Shirley Grindle, a citizen watchdog who says she monitors campaign contributions to county supervisors “to keep them honest.” A former county planning commissioner and aerospace engineer, Grindle led the push for the county’s campaign reporting and conflict-of-interest law, passed in 1978 and known as TINCUP--Time Is Now, Clean Up Politics.

Employees Called

Grindle said she was checking contribution disclosure forms early last February when she stumbled onto a group of first-time contributors who worked for GSX and who gave “large amounts of money” considering their positions in the company.

“I immediately suspected that these employees, who all gave around the same date and in similar amounts, were probably asked to give by their superiors,” Grindle said. “I suspected they would probably be reimbursed with company funds. But I had no proof.”

She called several of the contributors at work--a switchboard operator who gave $100 to Riley, a customer relations manager who gave $300 to Riley, and Otting. She said the operator and customer relations manager listened to her questions but denied that they would be reimbursed for the donations.

A man who claimed to represent Otting returned Grindle’s call but hung up, she said. Several days later, a GSX vice president based in Boston wrote to the supervisors saying that the company “has recently learned that certain present and former employees of GSX made contributions to your campaign committee which may have been reimbursed from company funds. In order to resolve any uncertainty regarding the source of these contributions, we would appreciate it if you would amend your campaign statement to reflect that the contributions from the following individuals were contributions from the GSX Corp. of Orange County. . . .”

Scope of Probe

Chinn would not comment on the scope of the investigation and would not say whether more charges may be filed against Otting or others.

Otting and GSX officials could not be reached for comment Wednesday. Byron K. McMillan, whom Chinn identified as Otting’s attorney, would not comment on the charges and refused to confirm that Otting was his client.

Peter Herman, Riley’s executive assistant, also refused to comment. “I don’t know anything about the case,” he said.

Ron Rogers, Nestande’s campaign manager, acknowledged that the supervisor and his staff cooperated in the investigation and had returned the $250 contribution from Otting to GSX.

“We amended our forms to reflect that the contribution came from GSX, and we refunded the money on March 26, 1986,” Rogers said.

Otting, who was not arrested, was ordered to appear for arraignment Oct. 24.