Supervisors Create Task Force on Land Fraud

Calling for an “early warning system” for land fraud, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors created a task force Tuesday to protect customers of developers such as Marshall Redman, who was charged last month in a series of desert land sales to unsophisticated Latino customers in the Antelope Valley.

Citing disclosures on the Redman property sales contained in recent Times articles, Supervisor Mike Antonovich said it was inexcusable that several county watchdog agencies had reacted slowly and ineffectively to the land sales--which spanned more than 16 years.

Antonovich called for Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti to appear before the board in two weeks to explain why charges were not filed sooner in the Redman case, despite numerous warnings of the allegedly fraudulent sales.

“The fact that one slick salesman could run roughshod through the state and local regulations to bilk so many people certainly does not speak well for these regulatory processes,” Antonovich told the panel. “A number of questions must be asked and new solutions found to prevent the reoccurrence of these schemes.”

Supervisor Gloria Molina directed the formation of a group to offer immediate help to the estimated scores of Redman customers who live in the far-flung Hi Vista area of Los Angeles County, many without utilities or running water.

She called for the county’s director of public works to return in 30 days with specific steps to “provide legal, technical and administrative remedies to the defrauded property owners.” Molina said the county should work to bring water service to affected customers, as well as electricity and building permits necessary to secure county services.

“The system certainly did fail,” Molina said. “Many of these people whose intentions were to own a piece of property became victims. Now we need to work with them and operate as their advocates. These families have nowhere else to go. All their money was invested in these properties. So let’s help them get to the bottom of this.”

Between 1978 and 1994, three companies operated by Redman, 67, sold undeveloped High Desert land to about 2,500 mostly working-class Latinos, who were allegedly promised that water and utilities would soon be provided on parcels that remain desert outposts.

Many other Redman customers allegedly were sold land zoned for commercial use or plots that the developer did not own, prosecutors say.

Redman was arrested last month on seven felony charges stemming from the sales. He pleaded not guilty and his attorney says problems associated with the sales stem from bad legal advice the developer received in the 1980s.

Antonovich asked that a task force of county government and industry groups return in six months with recommendations to stem land fraud schemes. He also called for an inquiry to determine whether “changes need to be made to state law regarding the use of contracts of sale,” such as those used by Redman’s firms.

Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky criticized county investigators for not recognizing the red flags of the allegedly illegal sales when visiting the properties of several Redman customers to cite them for building code violations.

In the early 1990s, Antonovich helped form a task force to cite hundreds of High Desert residents--many of them Redman customers--for zoning violations and building without permits. Several were removed from their properties.

Antonovich aides said the supervisor received numerous complaints from residents about substandard structures, prompting the formation of the task force of health, building and fire investigators.

On Tuesday, Yaroslavsky said the task force should have looked beyond its narrow focus of upholding the building codes to see hundreds of people in real need.

“What happened? Why weren’t alarm bells set off when our people were sent out to clear them off the land? Shouldn’t that have set off some kind of a warning bell among our inspectors to say, ‘What the hell was going on here?’ ”

Antonovich also criticized the district attorney’s office Tuesday for its delays in filing charges in the Redman sales, despite having been informed of the alleged scheme by several local agencies, including his own office, which he said referred cases to county prosecutors in 1994 and 1995.

Assistant Dist. Atty. Don Tamura, head of the agency’s real estate fraud unit, said prosecutors had known about Redman since 1993 but decided to delay pursuing criminal charges until other agencies--the Los Angeles city attorney’s office and the Kern County district attorney’s office--filed a civil lawsuit against Redman in 1994.

“There’s always been a plan to approach this case in a specific manner,” Tamura said. “We haven’t varied from that.”

He added that a task force consisting of state and local agencies already meets regularly to discuss land fraud cases, including the Redman sales.