Disgraced Do’s scheme dubbed ‘Robin Hood in reverse’ by federal prosecutor
Good morning. It’s Wednesday, Oct. 23. I’m Carol Cormaci bringing you this week’s TimesOC newsletter with a look at some of the latest local news and events.
If anyone needs a prime example of why legitimate news agencies are of value to society, Tuesday’s news that a lengthy investigation by LAist into shady doings by a member of the Orange County Board of Supervisors has culminated with Andrew Do’s utter fall from grace.
Last November LAist first reported in a bombshell article that Do had voted in favor directing millions of taxpayers dollars in two subcontracts to the nonprofit Viet America Society without disclosing his daughter’s connection to it. Rhiannon Do was listed as president of the organization. The money was supposed to go toward providing meals for the elderly and needy during the COVID-19 crisis. But, as it turned out, only a small fraction of it was used for that purpose.
Other news organizations, including the Los Angeles Times and Orange County Register, followed up on that story and the pressure was on. LAist stuck with its investigation, which kept applying the heat. Not surprisingly, Do issued a statement early on downplaying his lapse in judgment.
But, as we all now know, it was not a lapse. It was intentional.
“In the months that followed [the many news reports] the county demanded Viet America Society return the money after it launched an audit to look into the nonprofit,” The Times reported. “The county would end up filing a lawsuit in August against Viet America Society and censuring Do in September. Last week, Do’s chief of staff resigned after it was reported his girlfriend had worked for a nonprofit that received a lucrative county contract.”
A federal investigation was also underway, and on Tuesday — just 11 months after the story first broke — a news conference was held to announce the results.
Do, 62, agreed to plead guilty accepting more than $550,000 in bribes to direct more than $13.5 million to the nonprofit, and he agreed to step down from the Board of Supervisors as part of a plea agreement with federal authorities, The Times reported.
“This money was intended to provide meals to the people who needed most in our community,” said U.S. Atty. Martin Estrada during the news conference. “The scheme essentially functioned like Robin Hood in reverse.”
Do also admitted to funneling $381,000 of the funds to purchase a home in Tustin, as well as $100,000 to his daughter.
O.C. Supervisor Katrina Foley and her board colleague Vicente Sarmiento in August pushed for the county, state and feds to investigate the matter, endorsed the county lawsuit against the nonprofit and started calling for Do’s resignation.
“Instead of serving as an example of what the American Dream can achieve, Andrew Do dragged his family and associates into an American Nightmare,” Foley stated in a news release Tuesday morning. “I am disgusted by the staggering level of corruption, greed, and deception described in the federal indictments. Andrew Do and his associates carried out an overt scheme to enrich themselves off our hard-earned tax dollars. Our tax dollars are not Monopoly money for powerful elected officials to use to enrich themselves and blatantly defraud our government. Andrew Do and his enablers must pay the price for their crimes against the people of Orange County.”
MORE NEWS
• One of the oldest houses in Costa Mesa, believed to have been built around 1880 and known as the Station Master’s House, is on the market, the Daily Pilot reported. Measuring just 900 square feet, the home is one of a few structures on the same property, a couple of them industrial buildings, that are being sold together with an asking price of $2.6 million. Commercial real estate broker Ashwill Associates holds the listing.
• For those who may be following the long saga of Huntington Beach’s defiance of state mandates to allow for more affordable housing units to be built: City Atty. Michael Gates found himself in Pasadena Monday to appeal the most recent ruling against the city’s stance before the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. According to the Daily Pilot’s coverage of that hearing, the three judges Gates pleaded his case to seemed skeptical of his argument that because Huntington Beach is a charter city the state can just stay out of Surf City’s business. It may take several weeks or even months before the final decision is rendered, Gates told reporter Matt Szabo. The city attorney also said that being in front of the panel was akin to facing a “firing squad.”
• Crime is shaping up to be one of the most critical issues in the campaigns of state Sen. Dave Min (D-Irvine) and Republican Scott Baugh, who are vying for the seat representing the 47th Congressional District that Democrat Katie Porter held until she made a failed bid for the U.S. Senate. The district includes such relatively safe communities as Irvine, Newport Beach, Costa Mesa, Laguna Beach and Huntington Beach. Reporter Hannah Fry, our colleague at The Times, took note that the Republicans “have seized on crime as a potential way to appeal to voters and flip the highly sought seat.” But Min maintains he is not soft on crime, according to Fry’s story, and in fact has accused Baugh of lying about Min’s record. You can find all the details on how Min and Baugh are fighting it out to the election day finish in Fry’s story.
• Scott Markowitz, a candidate this fall for a seat on the Fullerton City Council, was arrested on perjury charges last week, according to the Orange County district attorney’s office. Markowitz allegedly falsified nomination paperwork in his campaign to represent District 4 in the southwest part of the city, TimesOC reported. His name is still on the ballot, but officials at the D.A.’s office said that if he is elected he will be ineligible and the city will have to hold a special election to fill that seat.
• Unless a couple of them change their minds a third time, members of the Fountain Valley City Council agreed on a 4-1 vote last week that they will, after all, get a raise from $500 to $1,200 per month for their work on behalf of the city. An increase from the current stipend was approved during a first reading on Sept. 3, but it was voted down when Mayor Glenn Grandis and Vice Mayor Ted Bui, both of whom are seeking reelection, flipped their votes at the second reading of the ordinance on Oct. 1. Grandis and Bui rethought their positions (again!) and voted in favor of the raise.
• Council chambers at Fullerton City Hall were packed last week when the City Council was set to discuss continuing to ban vehicle traffic from a section of Wilshire Avenue where outdoor dining was permitted after the pandemic set in. After hearing from public speakers, most of whom supported maintaining the status quo, the panel voted to extend “Walk on Wilshire” until Jan. 31 while the city studies a plan to expand and make it permanent, my colleague Gabriel San Román reported.
• At the beginning of last Wednesday evening’s Shine the Light walking vigil, Costa Mesa Mayor John Stephens, Councilwoman Arlis Reynolds and Police Chief Ron Lawrence proclaimed October as Domestic Violence Awareness Month with a resolution shared with Maricela Rios-Faust, chief executive of the nonprofit Human Options. The vigil drew about two dozen participants who carried purple LED candles while traveling along a path at Lion’s Park. Human Options, which provides financial and legal aid, access to shelter and other forms of support to people who have endured domestic violence, began hosting the vigil in 2022.
PUBLIC SAFETY & COURTS
• Authorities are searching for a masked bandit who shot at a teller at a Chase Bank branch in Lake Forest before making off with $31,000. The teller was not injured. The bank is located near the intersection of Portola and Bake parkways not far from Foothill Ranch Elementary School, which was temporarily placed on lockdown as deputies combed the area.
• Two men who had advertised a brothel via fliers placed on neighbors’ cars were arrested by Irvine police last week on pimping and pandering charges, The Times reports. The fliers included contact information that led officers to a home in the city’s Cypress Village neighborhood, Sgt. Karie Davies said. Qiyin Jiaqiyin, 51, of Irvine and Xiaoming Ding, 36, of Whittier were booked into the Orange County Jail where they were held on $500,000 bail.
• Firefighters responding to reports of a fire at a house on Castle Rock Road in Laguna Canyon at about 6:30 a.m. Sunday successfully knocked down the blaze in about two hours. The occupants had evacuated the house, but their dog was rescued from inside the home by the first responders. A neighboring house also sustained damages from the blaze, according to the Laguna Beach Fire Department. The cause of the fire was under investigation.
• A reportedly topless woman seen running, then lying down in lanes of the Santa Ana (5) Freeway shortly before 9 p.m. Saturday was fatally struck by a vehicle, according to City News Service. The CHP was informed at 9:01 p.m. that a white Tesla model X had hit a pedestrian in the middle lanes of the southbound side of the freeway near the Culver Boulevard exit in Irvine. An investigation was still underway as of Monday afternoon.
• A 31-year-old man identified as Ralph Marin of Santa Ana was fatally struck by a car that fled the scene at around 12:30 a.m. Sunday, authorities said. Police said Marin was walking across Bristol Street when a vehicle traveling southbound struck him down and another vehicle passing by drove over him. The second driver remained on scene and cooperated with the investigation, according to the City News Service report.
SPORTS
• Beach volleyball standout April Ross, who began playing as a high school freshman 25 years ago, announced on Instagram last week that she will retire at the end of this season at the age of 42. Ross won three Olympic medals, including a gold with partner Alex Klineman in 2021 in Tokyo. Daily Pilot reporter Matt Szabo interviewed the Costa Mesa resident for a feature story detailing her many achievements over the years and to find out what her plans are going forward.
• Junior quarterback Timmy Herr threw three touchdown passes as San Juan Hills earned a 30-7 victory over Newport Harbor Friday night, moving into first place in the league with two games remaining. With that win, the Stallions, ranked No. 22 in the state by MaxPreps.com, improved to 7-1 overall and 3-0 in league.
LIFE & LEISURE
• With a nod to the November election, artist Nina Katchadourian’s temporary public art installation in a yard at 896 S. Oakwood St. in Orange consists of 59 signs bearing the names of losing candidates from every presidential election in American history. Presented by the Grand Central Art Center, in collaboration with Community Engagement, the installation is expected to stay up until Nov. 17. Katchadourian began showing “Monument to the Unelected” in 2008 and has reinstalled it every election cycle since then. This year it is also being shown in Scottsdale, Ariz., as well as in Oakland, Napa, San Francisco, Madison, Wis., and Northfield, Minn., simultaneously.
• A Laguna Beach artist was stunned by a phone call she received over the summer providing the whereabouts of one of her paintings that had been stolen 10 years ago. Christiana Lewis Ulwelling told the Daily Pilot the large artwork titled “Elevate,” a 14-foot-by-6-foot piece weighing approximately 40 pounds, was taken from an underground parking garage one night in the winter of 2014. “The piece is about elevating as a human, becoming the best version of yourself that you can by basically checking in with yourself every day, several times a day,” Lewis Ulwelling told the Daily Pilot for this feature article. “The funny thing about this piece is because it was stolen, which is definitely not elevating, … I was kind of like, ‘Well, whoever has this, I guess they need to have it because maybe they need to elevate themselves.’”
• A new documentary titled “Rock Soup” spotlights the remarkable body of philanthropic work of Orange County residents Leo and Teresa Razo. The 29-minute film debuted earlier this month at the Awareness Film Festival in Los Angeles. According to this Daily Pilot story, the Razos, owners of Villa Roma market and restaurant in Laguna Hills and Cambalache Grill in Fountain Valley, have so far raised more than $1.5 million for nonprofits and helped feed more than 2.5 million people in need worldwide.
CALENDAR THIS
• The Anaheim Halloween Parade will mark its 100th birthday when it steps off at 7 p.m. this Saturday as part of the city’s Fall Festival, which takes place from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. The hometown parade starts at the intersection of Anaheim Boulevard and Broadway and proceeds down Center Street Promenade and Broadway. In case you missed the TimesOC story that includes the history of the parade, you can find it here.
• “Candlelight Yorba Linda: A Haunted Evening of Halloween Classics,” a live musical performance of Halloween-themed music, will be presented in a candlelit setting on Oct. 30 and 31 at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Museum in Yorba Linda. The Oct. 30 performance of the show is sold out, according to this TimesOC story on the event, but tickets for two Oct. 31 performances, one at 6:30 p.m. and another at 9 p.m., are still available. Attendees must be 8 years old or older, and anyone under the age of 16 must be accompanied by an adult. Tickets can be found here.
• Tim Rush, a founding board member of Preserve Orange County, will lead a historic architecture walking tour of the French Park neighborhood of Santa Ana this Saturday, Oct. 26, from 2 to 4:30 p.m. The French Park area boasts homes of a variety of styles, including Queen Anne, Colonial and Period Revival, Italianate, Craftsman and Modernist. Tickets start at $23.18and must be purchase here in advance.
Until next Wednesday!
Best,
Carol
KEEP IN TOUCH
I appreciate your help in making this the best newsletter it can be. Please send news tips, your memory of life in O.C. (photos welcome!) or comments to carol.cormaci@latimes.com.
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