Help Offer for Drunk-Driving Cases Reviewed : Courts: Affidavit says two men are suspected of offenses including practicing law without a license. No charges are filed.

Two east Ventura County men are under investigation for allegedly promising to obtain dismissals in drunk-driving cases in exchange for a $3,500 fee.

Donald J. Kellar of Thousand Oaks and Bengt Selander of Moorpark are suspected of grand theft, false advertising, conspiracy and practicing law without a license, according to a sworn statement filed in Ventura County Municipal Court by the district attorney’s office.

No charges have been filed, but Deputy Dist. Atty. Kevin G. DeNoce said the investigation is continuing.

According to the affidavit, which was filed to obtain search warrants, the two men posted flyers at the East County Courthouse that said: “DUI’s dismissed, 100% Guaranteed. . . . Find out how you can legally have your DUI ticket dismissed!”

An undercover district attorney’s investigator who dialed the toll-free number on the flyer was told by Kellar that for a $3,500 fee, his firm would provide legal briefs and a courtroom script that would result in dismissal of a DUI case, according to the affidavit.

Neither Kellar nor Selander is listed as an attorney on California State Bar records, according to the affidavit, which was written by investigator Thomas L. Kitchens.

The district attorney’s office knows of only two cases in Ventura County in which DUI defendants sought the services, and both were convicted, DeNoce said.

However, he added, “One of the concerns is that these people have represented themselves as part of a national organization. If this is going on across the nation, we may have hit just the tip of the iceberg. I just don’t know.”

In a taped conversation, Kellar told the undercover investigator that he has handled 15 to 20 DUI cases in Ventura County, according to the affidavit. Kellar also said he works for a national organization called Help American Taxpayers that has handled between 400 and 500 such cases nationwide.

Kellar could not be reached for comment Tuesday, but Selander said he and his partner had barely begun operations in Ventura County when prosecutors told them to shut down.

“We didn’t have that many clients, I can tell you that,” Selander said, adding that the service was forced to close when prosecutors seized its records and other paperwork in searches last month.

He said he and his partner were simply trying to educate people on their rights. “Attorneys and judges have a monopoly on that,” Selander said. “So if somebody else wants some of that money, you’re interfering with their income.”

But DeNoce said the legal arguments filed by people who had consulted the pair were “pretty absurd.”

For example, he said, one motion argued that California was not properly incorporated into the United States, and that therefore its laws did not apply to the defendant.

“That’s really just nonsense,” DeNoce said, adding that two of the most widely respected legal publications on drunk-driving defense do not recommend such legal tactics.

In the two Ventura County cases that have come to light, each defendant filed the same eight motions at trials during January, and all were rejected. Neither defendant put on a defense or rebutted the district attorney’s evidence, according to the affidavit. They merely told the judge they objected to the trial--a tactic recommended in a script that Kellar provided to the undercover officer, the affidavit said.

Selander maintained that the legal motions have prevailed on appeal in other jurisdictions where services like his have been set up. The only case he could cite was one in Laughlin, Nev.

“Put it this way,” he said. “The people that have gotten into this have gotten people off through the filing of these briefs. It’s a process, and it’s not going to happen in lower, municipal courts. It has to be appealed.”

Russell Nixon, a Thousand Oaks man who sought help from Selander and Kellar, wants no further dealings with the pair, according to his father, Glen Nixon.

“He’s in work furlough,” Glen Nixon said Tuesday, adding that his son is serving a 900-day sentence for his latest drunk-driving case and violations of probation in earlier cases.

He said his son paid $500 in cash for the services and gave the title to his car as collateral for the $3,000 balance. The district attorney’s office seized the title when it served search warrants on the homes of Kellar and Selander last month.

“They’re bad, bad news,” Glen Nixon said.

DeNoce said the case is unusual because criminal defendants are the alleged victims.

“We could have sat back and watched their clients being sent up the river,” he said. “But when you step back, this is unfair. As prosecutors we have a duty to step in and prevent this fraud from occurring.”