Former Supervisor Schabarum Indicted

Former Los Angeles County Supervisor Pete Schabarum has been indicted by the county grand jury for allegedly embezzling $50,000 from a charitable group he heads and using the money for personal travel around the world, according to the indictment and a source close to the investigation.

Schabarum, a conservative known for his often outspoken and belligerent ways, was indicted Feb. 5 after three days of secret hearings before the grand jury.

A former chairman of the grand jury himself, Schabarum is a staunch law and order politician who is considered the godfather of California’s movement to impose term limits on elected officials as a way to keep them accountable to voters.

Schabarum, 68, was allowed to surrender Tuesday to Superior Court Judge John H. Reid, who released the former supervisor on his own recognizance. Schabarum, who retired from public office in 1991, had no comment Tuesday.

“He’s not going to say anything,” Schabarum’s lawyer, John Barnett said. “He did not embezzle monies from his charitable corporation. He is not guilty of the charges.”

Reid set a March 14 arraignment after Barnett said he and his client need to read the transcripts of the grand jury proceedings before they can respond to the charges.

Authorities had no comment on the indictment except to say that Schabarum had been under investigation for two years by the district attorney’s special investigations division.

The indictment alleges two counts of grand theft by embezzlement, one count of perjury and three counts of state tax evasion--all stemming from Schabarum’s role as head of the Los Angeles-based nonprofit organization known as the Foundation for Citizen Representation.

According to the indictment, Schabarum is suspected of illegally skirting laws designed to prevent the misuse of tax-exempt foundation money by donating money to the nonprofit Natural History Museum Foundation.

The funds then were diverted to finance Schabarum’s travel to Africa, South America and potentially other exotic locales in the years after his retirement from the board, according to the indictment and a source close to the investigation.

Marcus Rodriguez, a former county official, is suspected of helping Schabarum launder the money ultimately used to pay for the trips, according to the source.

Rodriguez, former chief deputy director of the Natural History Museum, is serving a seven-year prison term after being convicted of embezzling as much as $2 million in museum foundation money in late 1995. That conviction is not related to the current case involving Schabarum, a source said. Rodriguez is not named in the Schabarum indictment.

The embezzlement and perjury count involve alleged activities from April 1993 to August 1994, including willful falsification of nonprofit documents that stated what money from Schabarum’s foundation was to be used for, according to the indictment and the source. The tax evasion counts cover the years 1993 to 1995, and allege that Schabarum should have paid taxes on the money spent on his trips.

Schabarum could be sentenced to six years in prison if convicted on all counts.

The source said Schabarum set up his nonprofit foundation with money from his campaign war chest, which he otherwise could have lost when he retired. He then gave as much as $50,000 of the funds to the Natural History Museum Foundation, and Rodriguez then helped Schabarum by using that money to pay for the trips, according to the indictment and the source. The source said it would have been illegal for Schabarum to use his own foundation to pay for the trips because they had nothing to do with its stated purposes of political education.

Authorities had no comment on whether Rodriguez is cooperating in the investigation into Schabarum’s activities.

Rodriguez is listed as one of the witnesses used by district attorneys in taking their case to the grand jury, Barnett said.

Museum vice president Chris Hills said none of the transactions alleged in the indictment were knowingly approved by museum officials, and that the museum and its foundation have not lost any money as a result of the allegedly illegal activity.

The museum foundation has filed suit against Rodriguez to recover as much as $2 million in embezzled funds stemming from his own criminal case.

In recent years, Schabarum has been a county lobbyist who makes about $10,000 a year representing companies before the supervisors. When he retired, Schabarum said he was leaving office because the job is “not as much fun as other things these days.”

Schabarum’s lawyer implied that the charges against the former supervisor may be politically motivated, especially because of Schabarum’s lead role in getting many elected officials kicked out of office by arguing for term limits.

But Schabarum made enemies elsewhere as well, especially in his role as a no-nonsense supervisor who did not try to hide his contempt from other county officials, administrators and even his constituents.

Schabarum, for instance, is infamous for nearly sending a 133-pound grandmother to the hospital during a county-league softball game when he ran her down as she tried to protect home plate. Asked afterward why he did it, Schabarum said, “That’s baseball.”

“Pete made a lot of enemies while he was a public servant for over 25 years,” Barnett said, “[but] we simply do not know why he was selected for prosecution.”

Barnett said he and Schabarum are angry that the secrecy surrounding the grand jury process has prevented them from knowing exactly how Schabarum is alleged to have broken the law.

“We are uninformed as to the basis, type or nature of the charges,” Barnett said.

“This happens every time the grand jury process is used. The targets don’t have any way to defend against secret charges, secret witnesses. So we are at a terrible disadvantage during the entire process.”

If a criminal case is handled by prosecutors filing a complaint and then outlining their case at a preliminary hearing, defense lawyers get some sense of the evidence against their client, Barnett said. But in grand jury proceedings, witnesses are not identified, or subject to cross-examination, until trial, he said.

Nevertheless, he stressed that all of the money spent by Schabarum from his foundation “went to legitimate entities, a variety of charitable organizations and tax-exempt organizations like the Natural History Museum Foundation and other legitimate causes.”

“It is a very common practice, in that particular entities or foundations will sponsor individuals to take trips to further the interests of the sponsor,” Barnett said. “Any trips that Mr. Schabarum was sent on, it is Mr. Schabarum’s belief that they were done with the direct authorization and consent of the sponsor.”

Authorities have refused to comment on what trips they are investigating because the grand jury transcripts remain under seal.

County records show that the museum and Rodriguez paid $6,000 for Schabarum to take a January 1988 trip to Antarctica--while he was still a supervisor.

Barnett said there was nothing wrong with that either. “The trip-taking is something that all or most public officials are involved in; this is a practice that has gone on for 30 or 40 years,” Barnett said.

Schabarum is the first supervisor in recent memory to be indicted for actions that occurred either during his tenure or afterward.

Several of his former colleagues expressed shock and dismay Tuesday.

‘If the charges are true, I am extremely disappointed in the actions taken by Mr. Schabarum,” said his former conservative ally Mike Antonovich. But, he added, “That action is out of character for Pete Schabarum, who is independently wealthy and has no need to take shortcuts.”

Asked for comment, Supervisor Gloria Molina said: “Wow. Other than being surprised by it and shocked by it, I don’t have anything else to say.”’