Ex-Bell Gardens Official Links His Firing to Casino Probe : Gaming: Former city manager says council was pressured to oppose his effort to clean up revenue-producing Bicycle Club. City attorney denies accusations.

Starting a new offensive against his critics, the former Bell Gardens city manager contends he was fired in part because of his efforts to clean up the scandal-plagued Bicycle Club Casino, which he says exerts heavy influence over city leaders.

Charles Gomez was dismissed by the City Council at a special meeting last Friday at which the council also announced the hiring of former state attorney general John K. Van de Kamp, now a private lawyer and consultant, to review the city’s relationship with the casino.

After his firing, Gomez told reporters it resulted from his refusal to carry out orders from council members to favor Spanish-speaking Latino employees in hiring and promotions--a policy city officials denied exists.

But in recent days, Gomez has shifted his stance, saying he was primarily ousted after he began probing possible criminal activity at the Bicycle Club.

On Tuesday, Gomez told a legislative committee exploring the possibility of establishing a gaming commission that local officials had been reluctant to investigate suspected criminal activity because of the city’s dependence on casino earnings.

The Bicycle Club brings in 60% of the city’s revenue through an arrangement that has been emulated by other Southern California cities to supplement their budgets.

“The pressure from the ownership of the clubs gets pretty intense on the local politicians, who end up being the bosses of the administrators and the chiefs of police. And so the pressure comes in to ease off,” Gomez told the Assembly Governmental Organization Committee.

In interviews Wednesday and Thursday, Gomez continued to press his assertions, insisting that there is “a link” between his firing and his work to investigate criminal activity at the casino. But Gomez did not cite to the committee or The Times any examples of City Council members or other political leaders intervening on behalf of the casino or directly obstructing any of his investigative efforts.

He would say only that their actions were “subtle” and led to his dismissal.

Mayor Maria Chacon declined to comment on Gomez’s statements and referred inquiries to Bell Gardens City Atty. Arnoldo Beltran.

Beltran denied Gomez’s accusations, saying Gomez was fired for poor performance. He called Gomez’s remarks to the committee “no less a destruction of reputations than was witnessed during the McCarthy period.”

Beltran said he has been asked by City Council members to review Gomez’s statements and that he will decide by next week whether to pursue slander allegations against him.

Van de Kamp said that, as a consultant, he will look into several aspects of the casino’s management and its dealings with the city, including its hiring and city work permit procedures, the operation of games and the pending sale of the federal government’s interest.

“The city wants it to be as clean as a whistle,” Van de Kamp said, adding that he will report his findings to the council in April.

At the Assembly hearing, Gomez said that when he took over as city manager in July, 1993, he found that the city had not thoroughly checked the backgrounds of casino workers, as it is required to do before issuing work permits. He cited the hiring of Hollman Cheung, who had continued to work at the casino after being investigated by federal officials in 1991 and indicted in 1993.

After he probed the casino’s operations in 1993, Gomez said, City Council members began to blame him for falling revenues from the casino during 1994. That, he said, in addition to a personal feud with the mayor, prompted his firing: “They got rid of me.”

The city’s $2.3 million in revenue from the casino in the fourth quarter of 1994 was roughly $200,000 less than in the first quarter.

Harry Richard, Bicycle Club administrative officer, said competition from nearby casinos hurt the Bicycle Club last year. Richard said he is unaware of any moves to hamper Gomez’s efforts to oversee the casino. “We were always there to assist them (Gomez and the police). I never felt at all that he was under any pressure.”

Times correspondent Enrique Lavin contributed to this article.