Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Ex-Workers Sought for Reimbursements

The district attorney’s office in Lancaster is looking for nearly 300 former employees of a once-prominent electrical contractor who has admitted that he owes the workers about $650,000 in pension money.

James H. Paxin, 40, who closed his Lancaster business in 1991, was sentenced in August to nine months in County Jail after prosecutors alleged that he had shortchanged his employees’ pension fund, violating his probation for an earlier offense.

At the sentencing, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Charles Horan ordered Paxin to repay his former workers.

This week, the district attorney’s office sent letters informing 255 of these workers that Paxin had signed documents acknowledging his debts to each of them. The amounts ranged from $15 to more than $12,000.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Stephen L. Cooley said Tuesday that his staff is still trying to find addresses for 39 other workers who are owed money by Paxin.

Although the contractor has said he cannot pay the debts now, the non-dischargeable civil obligations would allow the workers to collect if any Paxin assets are found, or if the contractor receives money in the future.

Even if Paxin declares bankruptcy, it would not wipe out these court-ordered debts, Cooley said.

“We didn’t want to give these beneficiaries a hollow victory,” the prosecutor said. “We wanted to assure that there was something in place that would give the beneficiaries an opportunity to get the money owed to them.”

Cooley said the workers, after obtaining proof of the debts from the district attorney’s office, could band together and hire a civil attorney to try to collect from Paxin.

The pension fund problems were uncovered while Paxin was on probation for payroll fraud. Before his business closed, Paxin’s firm had done electrical work on numerous government projects in the Antelope and Santa Clarita valleys.

Prosecutors contended that Paxin shortchanged the pension fund by about $650,000 while struggling to keep his business solvent between 1989 and late 1991.

Paxin’s attorney, Timothy L. Orr, said Tuesday that the former contractor has no money to pay numerous debts--including his legal fees.

“He will be filing for bankruptcy eventually, but we don’t know what all the debts are yet,” Orr said. “He’s basically lost everything.”

Added Orr: “He could have avoided a lot of this liability if he had closed his business at the time of the original conviction. But he tried to keep it going.”

Prosecutor Cooley said former Paxin workers who do not receive letters but believe that they may be entitled to the pension money should contact Teresa Armstrong at (805) 945-6464.