Vacuum Companies Agree to Penalties

A group of companies accused of using heavy-handed and deceptive tactics to sell TriStar vacuum cleaners has agreed to comply with consumer protection laws and to pay civil penalties, Ventura County prosecutors announced Tuesday.

Several Orange County-based companies have agreed to pay civil penalties totaling $350,000, while admitting no liability.

Jonathan Alan Krogman, a businessman who distributed the vacuum cleaners for Newbury Park-based Health Rite Enterprises, has also agreed to pay $1,000 in penalties and to abide by consumer laws, officials in the Ventura County district attorney’s office said.

State and county prosecutors filed a complaint against the companies in January.

According to prosecutors, the companies pushed the vacuum cleaners on residents by leaving lottery-like scratch tickets on doorsteps and promising free vacations. When contacted by residents interested in the prizes, salespeople would go to the homes and launch a high-pressure pitch for the vacuum cleaners, which cost as much as $2,400 each, prosecutors said.

The demonstrations could last for hours, prosecutors said. Since 1993, about 40 people in Ventura County have filed consumer complaints about the vacuum salespeople, one of whom assaulted a customer, prosecutors said.

Those having reached an agreement with prosecutors include Primus Holdings L.P., now doing business as Interstate Engineering in Anaheim; Excel Distributing of Anaheim; and James T. Ogborn, a Lake Forest man, prosecutors said. Krogman, the Ventura County distributor, could not be reached for comment.