Driver Pleads Innocent, Supervisor Fails to Show Up in RTD Theft Case

A veteran RTD supervisor failed to show up in court Friday while a second long-time employee pleaded innocent to charges of using stolen RTD parts on his private charter bus.

Franklin C. Jack, 46, a maintenance supervisor with 15 years experience at the RTD, missed his Municipal Court arraignment because he was out of town on an unspecified “emergency,” said his attorney, Kenneth Sargoy. A warrant was issued for his arrest.

Jack is accused of stealing a bus air compressor from the Southern California Rapid Transit District’s Glendale maintenance yard and providing it to RTD bus driver Vernon Holloway, who, in turn, allegedly installed it on a charter bus that he owned.

Sargoy said he did not know where Jack was but that his family expected him back next week. Municipal Judge Glenette Blackwell issued the arrest warrant.

Search Conducted

Holloway, 45, an RTD driver for 11 years, pleaded innocent to using stolen RTD parts on his bus, which was impounded and searched after his arrest in April. RTD officials said the search turned up $5,019 in parts they suspect were stolen from the agency, but not all of the items were listed in the criminal charges filed against Holloway.

The RTD has been the subject of criticism for a range of difficulties over the past year, with alleged criminal activity lately joining the list.

Also on Friday, a private attorney, William Barnes, accused of participating in a scheme to collect fraudulent bus accident claims from the RTD, pleaded no contest to 17 charges related to insurance fraud. Barnes is one of five defendants in the insurance fraud case, which allegedly has cost the RTD hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Dist. Atty. Ira Reiner said Friday that the investigation into spare parts stolen from RTD is expanding and more arrests are anticipated. But the announcement puzzled a top RTD official, who said the agency knew nothing of an expanded probe.

“There are a number of RTD employees who are under investigation,” Reiner told reporters.

The district attorney urged transit agency workers with knowledge of illegal activity to contact his office.

‘Far More Extensive’

“The indications are that the thefts are far more extensive” than previously thought, Reiner said.

“If they’ve got something going on, they have not informed me,” RTD Assistant Police Chief Harry Budds said. “At this present time, we do not have any major parts investigation going on at the RTD.”

Herb Lapin, the deputy district attorney in charge of the RTD parts investigation, said the district attorney’s office had decided that the probe “will expand drastically” in cooperation with the RTD but that transit agency officials may not yet have been told.

Both the district attorney and Budds said that a review of RTD inventory records by a transit agency investigator showed that $173,000 worth of parts are missing from the Glendale maintenance yard where Jack worked.

Budds said it was not known if the missing parts had been stolen or simply lost. Lapin said the district attorney’s office suspects that the parts were stolen but it is not known by whom.

Reiner said apparent flaws in the RTD inventory system and his suspicion of widespread theft were reminiscent of recent cases at the Los Angeles Unified School District, in which employees took advantage of lax inventory practices to embezzle thousands of dollars in school funds.