Professor Jailed in Dispute With Neighbors Over Trash : Courts: Huntington Harbour resident has refused to pay a $114,500 judgment, saying she is broke. Contempt hearing is set.

A Huntington Harbour resident who has refused to pay a $114,500 judgment to neighbors who contend her property is a trash-laden eyesore was ordered to jail Wednesday.

Elena Zagustin, a professor of civil engineering at Cal State Long Beach who is on leave, failed to document her assets as previously ordered and was jailed by Municipal Judge Caryl A. Lee. Zagustin is expected to remain in jail until Monday, when Lee has scheduled a hearing to determine whether Zagustin is guilty of contempt.

Zagustin is the central figure of a long-running feud in Huntington Harbour that has pitted a group of neighbors in the upscale community against her. The neighbors complain that Zagustin has piles of rubbish in her yard; Zagustin has contended that she has no trash problem.

David A. Flynn, a plaintiff in the lawsuit by neighbors that resulted last November in the judgment against Zagustin, said the plaintiffs now contend that Zagustin seeks to avoid paying the judgment by having transferred about six Orange County properties to a living trust.

“We don’t care about the money at this point,” Flynn said, “We have offered to drop our lawsuit if she just sells the house and moves.”

At least two dozen neighbors took Zagustin to small claims court last August, hoping the action would either force her to clean up her property or move. A judge awarded the plaintiffs a total of $90,575.

Zagustin appealed that decision to Superior Court and lost. That judge increased the award to $114,500.

But by then, Zagustin had transferred her property, including six lots in Huntington Beach, Santa Ana, Garden Grove and Irvine, to the Zagustin Living Trust. Zagustin is listed as the trustee, said Nelson L. Cohen, the neighbors’ attorney.

In court, Zagustin told Lee she has no assets and is broke. Cohen said the professor’s property is worth at least $1.4 million, according to trust documents.

“Since she created the trust, there also has been a number of new corporations that she has started, some here in California and some in other states,” Cohen said. “It’s just a tangled web. I think the judge was getting tired of this woman’s answers that she does not know where any money or her assets are.”

Zagustin was represented by an attorney from the county’s public defender’s office. Deputy Public Defender James Merwin said he had some concern about Zagustin’s request to be provided with free counsel.

“I also raised that question with the judge,” Merwin said. “But on the documents she filled out for the court on Wednesday, she qualifies.”

Merwin said that he has given Zagustin the names of several private attorneys, and that on Monday he plans to determine whether she qualifies for a county public defender.

During an eight-year battle, Huntington Beach and the county have spent “tens of thousands of dollars” trying to get Zagustin to clean up her property, Flynn said.