5 Sentenced in Point Mugu Purchasing Fraud : Courts: A federal judge orders each man to serve two years in prison and make restitution to the government. The investigation at the naval base will continue.

A federal judge on Monday characterized five defendants in the Point Mugu purchasing fraud scandal as thieves who got caught “sticking their hands in the till” before sentencing each of them to two years in prison.

“It’s hard to evaluate who is the worst,” U. S. District Judge William M. Byrne Jr. said at the sentencing hearing in Los Angeles.

Byrne ordered each of the defendants--three Camarillo residents, one from Oxnard and a former Oxnard resident--to begin serving their prison sentences Jan. 12.

Asst. U. S. Atty. Patricia A. Beaman, who headed the three-year investigation by the Internal Revenue Service, the Postal Inspection Service and the Naval Investigative Service, said she was pleased with the progress of the investigation, given its scope and complexity.

“This is a significant investigation,” she said. “It undermined the entire purchasing system at the base between 1984 and 1989.”

The fraud involved orders placed for industrial merchandise--such as plumbing and electrical supplies--by purchasing agents and others from off-base suppliers. None of the merchandise involved military hardware.

Bogus invoices then were signed by Navy base civilian personnel, who represented that they had received the phantom merchandise, the government charged.

The invoices, according to the government, would then flow through a network of companies, not dissimilar to methods used by criminals to launder illicit cash.

“These invoices would demand payment from Point Mugu for nonexistent industrial merchandise,” according to court papers.

The fraud’s profits were split among the defendants and others.

All of the sentenced defendants are civilians, and no military personnel have been charged with wrongdoing.

Monday’s action did not end the government’s investigation of bribery, kickbacks and bid-rigging at Point Mugu Naval Air Weapons Station.

Sources said they expected additional Ventura County residents to be criminally charged next year.

The scheme used at the Point Mugu base also was used by two of the defendants to defraud the Los Angeles-based Unocal Corp. in its oil rig operations offshore from Ventura County, the government said.

Government investigators estimate that the total monetary amount of the fraud perpetuated at the Navy base--that can thus far be accounted for--is about $778,000.

They underscore, however, that by the time the investigation is completed, the scheme’s bottom-line cost to the government could skyrocket.

The fraud estimate in the Unocal case, which the government has closed with two convictions, was about $953,000, officials said.

Although a federal grand jury indictment declared that the conspiracy at Unocal and Point Mugu took place between 1984 and 1989, investigators believe that the scheme actually had been going on at the Navy base for two decades.

“We don’t know how extensive it really was,” Beaman told a reporter.

During the lengthy afternoon court hearing Monday, Judge Byrne became piqued as the defendants’ attorneys attempted to argue that their clients were not as culpable as some of the other defendants.

When one of the attorneys said his client did not keep all his illicit gains, but instead split it with others, Byrne’s patience appeared to wane.

“It’s not a Robin Hood situation,” he said.

“These guys went out and participated in a very, very unsavory scheme. It was not much different than sticking their hands in the till and stealing.

“They wanted to enhance their life and they went ahead and did it.”

The five defendants were:

* Bill M. Frazier, 47, of Camarillo.

Frazier received a two-year sentence for participating in the conspiracy to defraud Unocal and Point Mugu; and for tax evasion and mail fraud.

Frazier owns Camarillo Tool & Supply Co. and two fictitious firms that were used in the fraud, according to government charges.

Beaman said at the Monday hearing that he was one of the most culpable defendants. But investigators said he was one of the first to cooperate with the government.

Frazier also was ordered to make restitution to Unocal in the amount of $953,000 and to pay $174,000 to the government for his role in the Navy scheme.

* Martin S. Anderson, 45, of Castalia, Ohio, and formerly of Oxnard.

Anderson was president of the now-defunct Anderson Industrial Supply of Oxnard, another firm used to perpetuate the scheme, according to the government.

Anderson’s two-year prison sentence stemmed from his guilty pleas to the conspiracy and tax evasion.

Anderson was ordered to start paying $953,000 in restitution to Unocal once he gets out of prison.

* Joseph Martin Vach, 50, of Camarillo.

Vach was a civilian planner and controller in the public works section of the Navy base between 1977 and 1988 and one of two base insiders who was convicted.

Beaman said Vach was one of the two most culpable individuals in the scheme.

Vach’s two-year sentence was based on guilty pleas to conspiracy, tax evasion and the receipt of bribes. He was ordered to pay $777,739 in restitution to the government.

* Gary Dale Roberson, 38, of Oxnard.

Roberson worked in the base’s public works section between 1988 and last April and was the second Navy base insider who was convicted.

His two-year sentence was based on guilty pleas to charges of conspiracy, tax evasion and receipt of a bribe. He was ordered to pay to the government $517,000 in restitution.

Roberson expressed bitterness about his two-year sentence. “I’m also being sentenced for other pople’s crimes,” he told the court.

Beaman said Roberson made $135,000 from the conspiracy, but Roberson responded that “until the day I die I never got that kind of money.”

* Anthony C. Beckman, 43, of Camarillo.

Beckman was an off-base supplier between 1984 and 1989. His two-year sentence resulted from guilty pleas to conspiracy, tax evasion and mail fraud. He was ordered to pay $590,000 in restitution to the government.