Theft Charge Against Pair May Be Dropped

A Superior Court judge said Monday that he has tentatively decided to throw out a charge of felony grand theft against two former Oxnard card-club casino promoters who are charged with stealing $10,000 in an unrelated construction deal.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Jeff G. Bennett said Judge Allan Steele made his statement during a hearing Monday.

“The prosecution is fighting an uphill battle now,” Bennett said.

Attorneys for Michael E. Wooten, 45, and Frank Marasco, 48, asked Steele on April 2 to throw out charges of grand theft against their clients.

Wooten, of Camarillo, and Marasco, of Ventura, allegedly submitted a false $10,000 voucher to a consortium of Ventura County investors for work on a development project in Santa Paula, prosecutors said.

Instead of paying a construction firm for overseeing the work, the defendants spent the money, prosecutors said.

Bennett has urged Steele to let the charges stand, saying the pair split the money after lying to get it from the investors.

Defense attorneys, who could not be reached Monday, have told the judge that prosecutors have no evidence to prove the defendants broke the law. Acknowledging that Wooten and Marasco did not pay the construction firm to oversee the development project, their attorneys said the two men supervised the work themselves.

In a separate case, the defendants are charged with six misdemeanor counts of money laundering in connection with illegal contributions allegedly made to local officials, including two Oxnard councilmen. The defendants had proposed a card-club casino for Oxnard, but the City Council eventually rejected the idea.

Trial on the misdemeanor counts is scheduled to begin Thursday in Municipal Court.