In one incident, inspector took a child support check in exchange for silence
A former City Hall inspector has been charged with two counts of bribery for allegedly taking cash in return for covering up possible building code violations.
Martin Aguirre, 29, of Downey, was charged with the felony counts by the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office last week. He is scheduled to be arraigned on Tuesday.
Aguirre took more than $1,000 from Santa Monica residents and business owners after telling them they were violating the city’s building codes but that he would ignore the infractions if they paid him cash, authorities allege.
Aguirre was arrested by Santa Monica Police in a sting operation in February after he allegedly solicited a bribe from a business owner on Ocean Park Boulevard who was renovating his property.
Aguirre, who randomly walked into the business on Feb. 10 wearing his City of Santa Monica uniform, allegedly told the business owner he didn’t have the necessary permits for the construction work. Aguirre allegedly told the businessman to pay him $1,000 in cash and he would look the other way.
The business owner, who the D.A.’s office has declined to identify, told Aguirre to come back in a few days and he would have the money.
But instead, the business owner called SMPD, which then provided the businessman with marked currency. When Aguirre showed up to collect the cash, SMPD officers were waiting for him outside the store.
“It was a business owner who didn’t like to be squeezed and he called the cops,” said Richard Ceballos, deputy district attorney in the public integrity division. “For a lot of business owners, this is the cost of doing business.”
When Aguirre was arrested, police found $1,300 in cash in an envelope in his car but authorities couldn’t trace it, Ceballos said.
On Dec. 26, Aguirre allegedly told a Santa Monica homeowner that her garage was illegally converted into an apartment. He said he wouldn’t red tag it if she paid him $3,000 in cash. The woman told Aguirre that she was unable to produce that kind of money on the spot.
Aguirre allegedly returned to the property on Dec. 31, when he accepted her offer of $28.75 from her purse and a $200 child support check, which she cashed at a bank after he accompanied her there. He then told her he would be back on Jan. 6 to collect more money, Ceballos said.
On that date, Aguirre again accompanied the woman to the bank, where she gave him another $300. The woman even offered the change out of her daughter’s piggy bank and a Toys R Us gift certificate, but Aguirre didn’t take it, Ceballos said.
“Even criminals have standards,” he said.
Aguirre’s attorney, Dan Brookman, couldn’t be reached for comment.
Aguirre was a contract employee since October with an Ontario-based firm called JAS, which offers services to City Hall’s building and safety department.
Aguirre had worked as a city representative for only two months before city officials became suspicious of his work, said building inspector Tim McCormick.
Aguirre worked as both a code compliance inspector and a construction inspector in December 2002 and January and the early part of February of this year.
“In some ways, he knew we were closing in on him,” McCormick said, adding this is the first time a building and safety representative has been caught soliciting bribes. “This person was just waiting to be caught.”
Aguirre’s responsibilities included investigating building and safety violations, work permits, maintenance complaints, work-related noise complaints, zoning violations, nuisance complaints, sign violations, outdoor merchandising compliance and construction sites.
While it’s City Hall’s responsibility to check the backgrounds and qualifications of potential contract employees, it has not been an official policy to check an applicant’s criminal history — until now.
“What has come out of this is we are now doing complete criminal background checks for contract employees, which normally was done for city employees,” McCormick said. “It takes something like this to realize that you can be conned.”
The building and safety department hires contract employees as vacancies become available in City Hall, which in the past can be as many as five at one time. However, McCormick said no contract employees were in his department a couple of years ago.
The city currently employs seven code compliance inspectors and seven construction inspectors. Three of the 14 workers are temporary employees.
Planning department officials evaluate the applicant’s qualifications, then decide whether to hire him or her. They are then referred to JAS, where they are actually hired as a contract employee, McCormick said. “(JAS is) obviously upset they were hired by us and billed through their firm,” he said. “Now we have safeguards in place to deal with these types of people.
“He was an anomaly and is a person that wasn’t very sophisticated and was desperate.”
JAS representatives declined comment. Aguirre passed his building and safety inspector certification and has previously worked in construction and has no prior convictions.
He remains free and is expected to surrender to the charges at his arraignment next week, Ceballos said. Aguirre most likely will ask Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Harkavy to allow him to remain free on his own recognizance.
Aguirre faces up to eight years in prison and a maximum of $4,000 in fines for both counts.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on May 19, 2003. Read the original PDF.