Police Think Broker Slain in the Office of Her Rival

The Long Beach real estate broker who was shot to death and stuffed into the trunk of her car appears to have been killed in the office of a rival broker, police said Tuesday.

Police now believe that Arlene Lee Chee, 46, of Seal Beach was killed in the Realty One office owned by Vicente Lapid OCampo, 45, a former employee of Chee and a suspect in her murder, Long Beach Detective Ron Pavek said.

“We found evidence that led to that conclusion,” Pavek said. He declined to be specific.

Long Beach police Tuesday were seeking a warrant for OCampo’s arrest, but said the suspect may have left Southern California and fled to the Philippines, where he was born.

Chee’s body was found Thursday night in the trunk of her 1985 Mercedes-Benz just a few blocks from OCampo’s office on West Willow Street in Long Beach.

Family members said Chee did not return home Wednesday night. While after searching for her Thursday, they found her car on 25th Street near Fashion Avenue. They called police, who opened the trunk and discovered the body.

Family members told police that Chee had a noon appointment with OCampo on Wednesday. OCampo was last seen Wednesday afternoon, and his lawyer said OCampo has not been in touch with his family.

“Our client has not contacted us,” said Leonard A. Matsuk, OCampo’s lawyer. “Nobody’s heard from him. His wife hasn’t heard from him.”

Police said OCampo may have been angry with Chee because she recently hired one of his agents, whom police identified as Corine Bolden. Bolden, who began working for Chee last week, could not be reached for comment.

Arlene Chee’s husband, Eugene, said Bolden was one of OCampo’s best agents. “She kept that office going,” he said. “She kept the people’s spirits up.”

Chee Fired OCampo

OCampo was one of Chee’s first employees when she opened her Century 21 Fortune office in the 2500 block of Pacific Avenue in Long Beach in 1982. Chee fired OCampo that same year, and he set up his own real estate firm, according to police and Eugene Chee.

A spokeswoman for the state Department of Real Estate said that OCampo recently paid a $2,500 fine in lieu of a 30-day license suspension in a case involving negligence charges over escrow accounts. She said he was also ordered to pay $3,500 to the family that had filed the complaint.

Eugene Chee said that his wife, who was the second-youngest of nine children, had been a homemaker and a waitress in a family-owned restaurant--Chee’s Chinese Restaurant in Long Beach--before opening her business. The restaurant is across the street from OCampo’s office.

‘Had a Lot of Guts’

“She had a lot of guts to open the office then (in 1982),” said Eugene Chee, who worked in the same office with his wife. “The market was very, very bad.”

The Chees had been married for 27 years and have four adult children.

Last Friday, the Century 21 Pacific Region was to have given Chee a gold medallion for her outstanding sales performance, said Dana Petronis, a company spokeswoman.