Controller Awarded $4.5 Million in Termination Case

A jury has ordered that Los Angeles real estate firm Century Capital Management Inc. and its owner pay $4.5 million to an El Monte man who said the company wrongfully terminated him for blowing the whistle on tax code violations.

In recent weeks, a Los Angeles County Superior Court jury found by unanimous vote that former controller Marcelino “Mars” Songco, 44, was wrongfully terminated after discovering and reporting alleged accounting irregularities to the company’s owner, Sam Menlo, and his accountant after he was hired in 1994. It was the suit’s second trial this year. The first ended in a hung jury this summer.

“They basically wanted him to not complain. They criticized him for doing exactly the right thing,” said plaintiff’s attorney Philip J. Ganz Jr.

Songco was awarded compensatory and punitive damages of $4.5 million for his 90 days with the company after the jury found that Century and Menlo acted with “malice, fraud and oppression” in terminating the controller. He now works as a consultant for another Los Angeles real estate company.

Menlo could not be reached for comment on the verdict. But his Los Angeles-based attorney, Marshall G. Mintz, said Songco was dismissed not for whistle-blowing, but for his inability to get along with other workers and handle routine computer tasks. He said Menlo plans to appeal the decision.

“The damages were exorbitant. I don’t think the law will allow that verdict to stand,” he said.

Menlo owns about 65 properties across the Southland with a book value of $62 million, including apartment buildings, shopping centers, retirement homes and motels, according to Ganz.