Man Facing Fraud Charges Sues Officials

An Oxnard man facing criminal fraud charges for allegedly marketing a heat pump hailed as a source of “free electricity” filed a civil rights suit against the Ventura County district attorney and sheriff’s offices in Los Angeles federal court Wednesday.

Dennis M. Lee, 43, is facing 38 charges of violating California consumer protection laws and eight charges of theft by misrepresentation for marketing an allegedly energy-saving solar heat pump called the Alternative.

Lee is free on $20,000 bond, pending a trial in Ventura County Superior Court. But prosecutors have filed a motion to revoke his bail because “he is once again selling and using misrepresentation to do so,” said Deputy Dist. Atty. Rebecca Dean Riley.

Lee’s suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, alleges that sheriff’s deputies searched his Ventura office on Jan. 14, 1988, without a warrant and denied his right to free speech by arresting him on June 22, 1988, just before he was to host a marketing meeting at a hotel near Los Angeles International Airport.

The suit also charges that he was jailed for nine months on an unconstitutionally “excessive” bail of $1 million after his arrest, an amount that later was reduced.

The suit also alleges that the district attorney’s move to revoke his bail April 9, after he told a meeting of investors in February about his arrest, violates his right to free speech.

Riley said the Sheriff’s Department had a warrant for the search, which led to Lee’s arrest for allegedly defrauding potential investors in his heat pump company, CONSERVE Financial Services.

Lee’s print advertisements for the Alternative promised “free electricity extracted from the air,” Riley said. Lee sold videotapes, blueprints and documents describing the Alternative, and he offered investors a chance to buy into manufacture and marketing of the device, she said.

However, the videotapes misrepresented the performance ratings of the Alternative and falsely claimed that it was listed with Underwriters Laboratory and that the marketing plan included a bonding program, Riley said.

Riley and the Sheriff’s Department declined further comment.