Federal Agents Arrest Teacher Already Facing Drug Money Laundering Counts

A Huntington Beach schoolteacher already charged in state court with allegedly laundering money earned from drug sales was arrested Wednesday morning on federal charges stemming from the same case.

James Ralph Hoyland, 43, an Edison High School science teacher, was taken into custody at the Huntington Beach Union High School District office where he has worked at clerical tasks since posting bail nine months ago, authorities said.

Agents from the criminal investigation division of the Internal Revenue Service and state Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement took Hoyland into custody on an arrest warrant issued Tuesday.

Hoyland, who lives in Dana Point, appeared before U.S. Magistrate Venetta S. Tassopulos in Los Angeles Wednesday afternoon on charges he evaded federal currency reporting laws when he deposited more than $100,000 at five Orange County banks last year. He is being held at the Terminal Island federal correctional facility in lieu of $500,000 bail.

Same Evidence Used

According to Assistant U.S. Atty. Stephen G. Wolfe, the federal case is based on the same circumstances and virtually the same body of evidence collected for the trial now pending in Orange County.

But because federal laws provide stiffer penalties for moneylaundering convictions, prosecutors said they presented their case to a federal grand jury, which returned a six-count indictment against Hoyland Tuesday.

Orange County Deputy Dist. Atty. Craig E. Robison said he expects to dismiss the state charges against Hoyland at a Friday appearance in Harbor Municipal Court.

Under state law, both Wolfe and Robison said, six years is the maximum prison sentence Hoyland could receive for conviction of money laundering. If convicted of all six federal counts returned by the grand jury, according to U.S. Atty. Robert C. Bonner, Hoyland could be sentenced to 60 years in prison or fined $3 million--or both.

That, combined with the fact that with federal statutes “you don’t have to prove as many elements . . . tells you all you need to know,” Wolfe said.

Hoyland, who had taught science at Edison High School for 18 years, and his friend, John Frederick Ford, 41, a self-employed boat builder, were arrested Dec. 22, 1987, after a yearlong investigation by Newport Beach and Long Beach police, as well as state narcotics agents.

At that time, Ford was living in Belmont Shores and had sold Hoyland his 53-foot racing schooner, the Zamazaan, which was moored in Long Beach.

Before arresting the men, authorities confiscated $1.3 million in cash and gold from the bank safe deposit boxes of one or both men and seized Hoyland’s boat, as well as two Maserati cars and his Porsche. Hoyland later recovered the Porsche, and some other property, Wolfe said, adding that the U.S. attorney’s office and the FBI are now pursuing civil forfeiture actions on the boat and the cash.

Also searched at that time were financial accounts at four bank branches, Hoyland’s account at the Orange County Teachers Credit Union, his $450-a-month rented apartment and the boat, worth about $250,000.

In its six-count indictment, the federal grand jury charged Hoyland with trying to conceal the amounts of deposits or money exchanges made at several financial institutions between January and August, 1987. State law requires reports on currency transactions of $5,000 or more, while federal law requires disclosure for $10,000 or more.

The indictment said Hoyland deposited about $65,267 into various Orange County branches of Security Pacific National Bank, Bank of Newport and Bank of America between January and April, 1987, always keeping the deposits to less than $10,000. Wolfe said Hoyland also is charged with concealing the source of another $40,000 by exchanging $20 bills for $100 bills in a series of transactions during a one-week period in August, 1987.

Ford has not been charged in federal court but has been charged along with Hoyland in the state case. Both men have yet to be arraigned on the state charges because of numerous motions and continuances filed in the case, Robison said.