The FBI’s Oakland corruption case relies heavily on the word of one man with a ‘checkered past’

The morning of Jan. 17, 2025, federal prosecutors filed right into a windowless room on the San Francisco federal constructing and lined up solemnly behind the rostrum. 

They have been about to announce a bombshell political corruption case. Hours earlier they’d unsealed an indictment charging Oakland’s newly recalled mayor Sheng Thao, her romantic associate Andre Jones, and two native recycling moguls, David and Andy Duong, with orchestrating an elaborate bribery scheme.

In the meantime, the person who seems to be the FBI’s key informant within the case was on trip, barefoot on a ship flying the Greek flag from its stern. He smiled because the solar set over the ocean behind him.

“No stress, simply vibes,” he captioned images he posted on X.

Mario Juarez, a well known Fruitvale businessman, is extensively believed to be the individual federal prosecutors referred to within the indictment as “Co-conspirator 1.” Recognized by the feds as a neighborhood businessman, an energetic member of the native political group, a cofounder of a housing firm with the Duongs, and the determine behind damaging mailers focusing on Thao’s opponents within the race for mayor, Juarez is the one one that ticks each field. 

In accordance with the federal government, Co-conspirator 1 and the Duongs bribed Thao and Jones in pursuit of hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in metropolis contracts. 

The indictment consists of proof like textual content messages despatched by Co-conspirator 1 to Andy Duong, seemingly admitting to fraud. “So we could go to jail… however we’re $100 million {dollars} richer,” he wrote in a single change.

However Juarez doesn’t seem poised to do time.

As an alternative, it appears he could have averted repercussions by feeding the federal government a trove of data it used to carry fees in opposition to Thao, Jones, and the Duongs, in an indictment that leans closely on statements of Co-conspirator 1. Whereas his former associates have been court-ordered to not journey outdoors Northern California whereas they await trial, Juarez seems to be freely shifting about.

In October, the attorneys for David Duong filed a movement within the federal corruption case, attempting to get the proof in opposition to him tossed out. The federal government’s fundamental supply, his attorneys argued, is “a identified fraudster with a grudge.”

Duong’s attorneys be aware within the submitting that Co-conspirator 1 has been a celebration to some 33 lawsuits, wherein he’s been accused repeatedly of dishonest individuals, corporations, buyers, and authorities businesses of no less than a number of hundred thousand {dollars}. 

Only a few years earlier, Duong had trusted Juarez sufficient to launch a enterprise with him, promising to speculate $1 million in an organization peddling transport container properties to native governments. 

It gained’t be the primary time Juarez has evaded penalties after being linked to claims of wrongdoing. In quite a few circumstances over the previous 20 years, Juarez has been accused of fraud or embezzlement, solely to bounce again and pursue the following enterprise. He has gotten into enterprise with respected corporations and distinguished figures till many of those offers led to explosive falling-outs. Then got here messy lawsuits, and in just a few circumstances, felony fees. However Juarez has managed, to this point, to keep away from any felony convictions, and regardless of some hefty judgements, he’s all the time been in a position to transfer on, strike new offers, and domesticate new buyers.

We additionally examined data for Juarez’s two bankruptcies, enforcement data that led him to give up his actual property license, and data associated to a few felony prosecutions of Juarez for fraud, forgery, or embezzlement. It’s potential there are extra circumstances in different courts.

What’s most placing in regards to the Juarez story is that he maintained shut ties for a lot of this era with a number of the East Bay’s most influential political gamers, together with Rob Bonta, now the state legal professional common; his spouse Mia, now a member of the state Meeting; state Assemblymember Sandre Swanson; and Kathy Neal, a port commissioner and former Oakland first girl. Some, even after a number of fraud lawsuits had been filed in opposition to Juarez, intervened to vouch for his enterprise efforts, together with Rob Bonta in 2014. 

Juarez “found out he may make political connections and other people would maintain their noses,” as one social gathering activist informed us.

Bonta was just lately dragged into extra information in regards to the FBI’s case after a letter Juarez sent the legal professional common final yr surfaced. Within the be aware, Juarez informed Bonta that video of him existed in a “compromising place,” and that this video was in Andy Duong’s possession. Bonta just lately referred to as this “absolutely not true.”

Most political figures declined to remark for this story. Juarez didn’t reply to a number of interview requests. However in response to a number of of the lawsuits, Juarez has maintained that he’s been wrongfully accused — generally asserting that his accusers are literally those within the fallacious. 

The debt collector

Born in Honduras in 1977, Mario Juarez immigrated to the USA as a baby and grew up in Oakland, in the end graduating from Fremont Excessive College. In a current blog post, Juarez described the Oakland of his childhood as a troublesome one, the place his group was handled as “an afterthought,” gang members have been killing one another, and leaders did not act. “I didn’t find out about injustice from a textbook,” he wrote. “I lived it.”

His childhood was additionally scarred by a horrible crime. Juarez’s mom had enrolled him within the Boy Scouts, hoping he’d discover a constructive male function mannequin. However his troop chief, Jorge Francisco Paz, betrayed that belief, molesting him and different boys.

“Juarez was ashamed and saved it a secret” for a time, Robert Gammon wrote in a 2008 East Bay Categorical story. “However then, three years later in 1993, {the teenager} discovered the braveness to inform police what Paz had carried out.” Juarez testified in courtroom in opposition to a plea deal prosecutors searched for his abuser. Paz was in the end sentenced to 14 years in jail, and a lawsuit Juarez filed later in opposition to Paz and the Boy Scouts helped result in a reckoning within the group.

By his very early 20s, Juarez was already an entrepreneur, one drawn to a combative nook of the financial system: the collections business. 

He joined forces with a enterprise associate, Gergely Csaszar, to arrange an organization in Oakland, American Judgements Company. The enterprise mannequin was easy. Purchasers would rent the corporate to gather judgments gained in lawsuits and different authorized proceedings. Juarez and Csaszar acquired to maintain a small share of something they may accumulate.

In April 2002, Juarez was thrust into the primary of what would turn into many messy disputes with enterprise companions. Csaszer filed swimsuit, accusing Juarez of “changing” their firm’s belongings — shopper lists, computer systems, web sites, and extra — to his personal use by secretly organising a rival firm. Juarez had additionally used firm funds for private acquire, Csaszer claimed.

Juarez denied the allegations and argued the case couldn’t go any additional since he’d hit a troublesome spot financially. Juarez, at age 24, filed for chapter.

Csaszer’s case in opposition to Juarez doesn’t seem to have gone wherever, in keeping with courtroom data. Makes an attempt to contact Csaszer and his legal professional for this story have been unsuccessful. The legal professional who represented Juarez is deceased.

Juarez’s chapter case dragged on for an additional 5 years, throughout which Juarez generally did not make deliberate funds to collectors, leading to notices of default in 2003 and 2004, in keeping with the case docket.

In Might 2002, simply weeks after submitting for chapter, Juarez arrange a brand new debt assortment firm, The Judicial Group. The next month, Juarez scored a giant deal — a contract with town of Oakland. The Judicial Group was given the correct to contact individuals and companies who owed town cash, negotiate with them about compensation, and accumulate. Juarez acquired to maintain 49% no matter funds have been recovered, or $14,999, whichever was much less.

It’s unclear whether or not any metropolis officers knew in June 2002, when Oakland employed Juarez’s firm, in regards to the pink flags — the lawsuit his former enterprise associate had filed in opposition to him two months earlier than, or his chapter. However the metropolis’s contract with Juarez would show to be one of many first of many circumstances the place distinguished individuals and authorities businesses trusted a person with who already had a report of economic chaos and battle that might have given them pause.

Two years into town contract, Juarez started failing to observe its phrases, in keeping with a lawsuit town legal professional, then John Russo, filed in opposition to Juarez and The Judicial Group. The corporate, town claimed, cheated Oakland “by failing to precisely report the quantity of judgments that it collected beneath the settlement, and by failing to disburse to plaintiff, 51% of the judgments.” Juarez additionally did not return roughly $15,000 in a mistaken overpayment, town mentioned, and failed to keep up enterprise data. Russo even claimed Juarez had destroyed firm data “with the deliberate intent to hinder, delay, and defraud” town of Oakland.

Juarez’s legal professional, Michael Cardoza, denied the fees. However in 2007, Juarez and town settled, with Juarez paying Oakland $31,000.

Different purchasers have been quickly going through comparable frustrations over Juarez’s debt assortment companies.

In June 2006, Juarez was hit with one other lawsuit, wherein two purchasers claimed that he and his collections firm “saved for their very own unjust enrichment” $108,000 that was owed them after successful the sum from a negligent dentist. 

Then one other lawsuit landed, this time from an Oakland-based workplace tools firm, accusing Juarez of gathering cash from no less than two judgment debtors and failing to account for the cash and to pay the corporate. The corporate and Juarez finally reached a nondisclosed settlement.

The $108,000 collections swimsuit dragged on till 2010 when Juarez was ordered by a choose to pay $94,000.

Juarez has but to pay. 

Final yr, Todd Haines, who informed The Oaklandside he was employed to attempt to accumulate the cash from Juarez, filed papers in state courtroom displaying Juarez nonetheless owes $164,000.

As his collections work started to hit the skids, Juarez was already laying the groundwork for a brand new profession — in actual property. He obtained his dealer’s license in 2004, and was quickly constructing out a portfolio of labor, serving as an agent for homebuyers and shopping for and leasing business actual property. Lots of the offers would spark their very own lawsuits. However they might additionally permit him to supply vital favors to influential figures within the Democratic Social gathering.

Juarez enters politics

Juarez’s authorized troubles started to garner public consideration within the late 2000s, when he determined to leap into politics. 

In 2008, Juarez introduced he was working for Oakland Metropolis Council. He aimed to unseat Ignacio De La Fuente, the longtime consultant for Fruitvale, who was recent off a failed bid for mayor. Juarez had beforehand supported De La Fuente, together with in his unsuccessful mayoral bid, however the 2008 marketing campaign got ugly. 

In media interviews, Juarez claimed that Russo, town legal professional, had sued him solely as a result of he was good mates with De La Fuente, and the 2 males needed to cease him from working for workplace. Russo referred to as Juarez’s declare “absurd”; De La Fuente called him “a God-damned opportunist.” 

De La Fuente described Juarez to The Oaklandside extra just lately as a “bullshitter” and “con man” who had a foul title in Fruitvale.

Across the time Juarez was working for his seat, De La Fuente mentioned, group members independently contacted his Metropolis Council workplace about Juarez’s enterprise actions. “I heard from many individuals who got here to my workplace to complain,” he mentioned.

The 2008 marketing campaign surfaced different allegations. Juarez’s ex-wife, Araceli Lopez, accused him in courtroom paperwork of repeatedly hitting their son, the East Bay Categorical reported. A court-appointed counselor really helpful that Juarez steer clear of his son for a time frame, and a choose ordered him to cease utilizing corporal punishment.

Juarez misplaced the 2008 election — however he gained some powerful supporters.

As a candidate, Juarez picked up support from SEIU 1021, IFPTE Native 21, and the Oakland Training Affiliation, unions that symbolize hundreds of metropolis staff. He additionally acquired an endorsement from the Alameda County Democratic Social gathering. And the businesswoman Kathy Neal signed on as his marketing campaign supervisor. Neal was a politically related advisor who had served on the port fee and had been married to Elihu Harris when he was Oakland’s mayor. 

Neal informed The Oaklandside she met Juarez by way of a mutual good friend and wasn’t but conscious, when she agreed to be his marketing campaign supervisor, of simply what number of lawsuits have been dogging Juarez.

When De La Fuente determined to not run once more for the District 5 council seat in 2012, Juarez ran however misplaced to Noel Gallo, who nonetheless holds the seat. However Juarez picked up hundreds of {dollars} in contributions, in keeping with marketing campaign finance filings, together with from unions, the Oakland Chamber of Commerce, and influential politicos, together with Harris; Rob Bonta, who was then San Francisco’s deputy metropolis legal professional; Shawn Wilson, who was then chief of workers to State Assemblymember Nate Miley; Jim Odie and Vinnie Bacon, who would go on to turn into metropolis councilmembers in Alameda and Fremont, respectively; and state Assemblymember Sandre Swanson. 

Unable to crack the Oakland Metropolis Council, Juarez set his sights on the Alameda County Democratic Central Committee, an elected physique that endorses native candidates and sends assets their approach. Neal once more served as his information, displaying him how one can marketing campaign for a seat on the committee.

Juarez gained the seat in 2012. He rapidly grew to become an inveterate networker, in keeping with those that served with him on the committee.

“As quickly as he acquired on the central committee, he tried to make his actual property workplace the middle of exercise for Democrats,” mentioned Pamela Drake, who was additionally elected to the board in 2012. “He’d have conferences there, present foods and drinks, be magnanimous about what he’d provide.” 

“He all the time had cash, so he helped increase cash for individuals’s campaigns,” mentioned Margarita Lacabe, a member of the central committee from 2010 to 2020. “He allowed his workplace to be a spot for individuals to run workers from. He launched individuals to others. He performed the political recreation.”

In accordance with Lacabe, Juarez grew to become near essential individuals on the committee — together with the Bontas. 

In a declaration filed in state courtroom final December — a part of a movement filed by then-DA Pamela Worth, objecting to Juarez’s makes an attempt to have a felony case in opposition to him dropped —  Lacabe described Juarez and Rob Bonta as “shut political allies.” She mentioned the pair have been “consummate politicians who labored to befriend politically highly effective and resourced individuals.”

After Bonta was elected to the State Meeting in 2012, Juarez continued to help him by serving to him coordinate votes and nominations to verify Bonta maintained highly effective allies among the many officers of the Alameda County Democratic Social gathering Central Committee, Lacabe mentioned. However the males had a schism after Bonta sought to interchange Juarez as vice-chair of the native social gathering committee with a unique ally in 2016. However they apparently repaired their breach; in her declaration, Lacabe wrote that Juarez assisted “in securing Bonta’s Meeting seat for Bonta’s spouse when Bonta grew to become Legal professional Basic” in 2021.

“He tried to make his actual property workplace the middle of exercise for Democrats.”

Lacabe informed The Oaklandside that Juarez was in a position to make comparable alliances with different native elected officers. “He found out he may make political connections and other people would maintain their noses so long as he sends some cash their approach,” she mentioned. “And it’s not even that a lot cash as a result of native political campaigns don’t value that a lot.”

In 2020, Juarez supplied his Fruitvale workplace on Excessive Avenue to Councilmember Noel Gallo as a marketing campaign headquarters, in keeping with a lawsuit that was later filed in opposition to Juarez by his Fruitvale landlord. In 2021, Mia Bonta’s group additionally set up shop in Juarez’s building as she ran for Meeting. 

Once we first reached Gallo by telephone, he, like others we reached out to for this story, burst out laughing after we informed him we have been writing about Juarez.

In a later name, Gallo confirmed that Juarez supplied him the Excessive Avenue workplace, and mentioned he held some gatherings there however didn’t in the end use it as a headquarters. 

“I’ve identified Mario and his household for a lot of, a few years,” Gallo mentioned, including. “They all the time volunteered” at group occasions. The Fruitvale workplace, which Gallo lengthy thought Juarez owned till he came upon in any other case, was a hub for a number of politicians and native figures, he mentioned. Gallo recalled that when Juarez was there, the realm across the property was “immaculate,” however after he left, trash piled up.

Gallo mentioned he heard “on and off” about troubling enterprise dealings involving Juarez, however mentioned he stayed far-off. “The opposite stuff he acquired concerned with, I’ve no enterprise with that,” he mentioned. “I’ll depart it at that.”

Requested why he thinks Juarez constructed so many relationships with influential political figures, Gallo mentioned, “He’s all the time been serious about working for politics.”

At the same time as Juarez cemented these alliances, he continued to pursue actual property offers, a few of which landed him in scorching water.

Making performs in biofuel and actual property

After getting his actual property license, Juarez started to construct a various portfolio, as a dealer of economic and residential properties, a contractor, and a lease collector. Considered one of his early gross sales, a residential duplex that went in the marketplace in June 2005, rapidly went fallacious, ensuing within the first of many lawsuits associated to his new profession.

In April 2006, the property’s purchaser, an Oakland resident named Carlos Martinez, sued Juarez and one among his property corporations, Fireplace Realty, accusing them of withholding key details about a house. In accordance with Martinez’s lawsuit, Juarez toured the property with him, suggested him to make a proposal on the home above the listed worth, and helped line up a mortgage for him. Martinez claimed that Juarez “willfully” did not disclose that the home had been illegally divided right into a duplex and {that a} rear housing unit had been constructed illegally. After he purchased the home for half 1,000,000 {dollars}, Martinez claimed, metropolis inspectors found the unlawful unit and fined him. 

Juarez and his brokerage “deliberately, willfully, maliciously, recklessly and unreasonably abused their superior place by concealing or failing to find and disclose the true info and materials defects,” Martinez’s attorneys alleged. Juarez’s legal professional denied these allegations, writing in a courtroom movement that his shopper hadn’t made any claims about the home’s worth or the legality of the second unit.

That case, paused for a time resulting from Juarez’s ongoing chapter, reached a settlement in July 2008. The legal professional who represented Martinez didn’t reply to an interview request.

Across the time of that settlement, Juarez persuaded a pair of Nevada builders, who operated as Boyd Actual Property, to rent him to gather lease from tenants and renovate a business workplace area they’d bought at 4030 Worldwide Blvd., in Fruitvale, the place one among Juarez’s corporations was a tenant. 

However the builders rapidly soured on Juarez, in keeping with a subsequent civil criticism, after they found he didn’t have a contractor’s license and had, they claimed, embezzled a number of the lease he was supposed to gather. When Boyd tried to evict Juarez, the corporate claimed, he responded by encouraging different tenants to cease paying lease and dumping piles of trash and human waste on the property. 

“This case is an actual life nightmare model of the 1990 film Pacific Heights,” Boyd’s legal professional, Sandra Raye Mitchell, wrote within the lawsuit, filed in 2010. Within the movie, Michael Keaton performs a conman who strikes right into a swanky house and terrorizes his landlords, thwarting their efforts to evict him. 

Mitchell declined to be interviewed for this story, however she appeared to have found Juarez’s troubled authorized historical past when getting ready her criticism. Juarez had “an extended historical past, sample and apply of defrauding collectors by forming undercapitalized entities similar to firms and restricted legal responsibility corporations,” she wrote, “incurring money owed after which abandoning the entity and/or submitting chapter to discharge the money owed and deny a restoration to the creditor.”

The builders claimed Juarez and his corporations owed them tens of hundreds of {dollars}. Shortly after submitting the swimsuit, Mitchell sought a restraining order, claiming that Juarez assaulted her throughout a go to she made to the property. He “pushed me, hit me and hit me within the face after which tore my garments by ripping open the entrance and ripping off the buttons,” she wrote, including that “he dedicated this violence to intimidate and drive me off the case.” 

Juarez denied Mitchell’s claims and countered by in search of a restraining order in opposition to Mitchell, accusing her of a sample of harassment and locking him out of the property. He additionally accused her of punching him on the pinnacle.  

A choose issued an injunction in opposition to Juarez, which was later vacated on enchantment. 

Whereas Juarez was pissing off his actual property purchasers, he had different irons within the hearth. 

In 2008, Juarez created an organization referred to as Viridis Fuels with Neal, the one that’d given him entrée into Alameda County Democratic circles. Viridis’ board of administrators included Harris, the previous Oakland mayor, together with main native company gamers, similar to a Clorox director and the CEO of a regional financial institution. To produce the enterprise with cash, Juarez tapped his actual property purchasers, promising them large returns that he repeatedly did not ship on, in keeping with courtroom data. 

Juarez pitched Carlos Madrigal, an Oakland man he’d beforehand helped buy a house, about investing within the biofuel venture. In a subsequent civil swimsuit, Madrigal claims the 2 met up at a carwash, the place Juarez informed Madrigal he may flip a $50,000 funding right into a $150,000 return in three years. Madrigal was offered, however when he tried to get a few of his a refund in 2012, he claims Juarez refused to make him entire. A courtroom dismissed the case in October 2024, with Juarez and Madrigal every agreeing to bear their very own prices and attorneys’ charges. 

One other pair of spurned buyers had an identical expertise, in keeping with a criticism filed by Mauro and Hilda Bucio. The Bucios loaned Juarez $210,000 over the course of 2007 and 2008, which, they mentioned of their civil swimsuit, he failed to totally repay after the Bucios demanded fee. As he had with Mitchell, Juarez responded by submitting for a restraining order in opposition to Mauro Bucio, whom he accused of insulting and hitting him, and pointing his fingers at him in a threatening approach, as if he have been going to shoot. 

A choose ordered Juarez to pay the Bucios their loans with curiosity, totalling $338,000, however as of 2024, they’d not acquired that cash, in keeping with the San Francisco Chronicle. 

At the same time as Juarez grew to become embroiled in litigation along with his buyers, he continued to push the biodiesel plant. In 2014, Juarez appeared at conferences of the East Bay Municipal Utility District, the place he offered updates in regards to the venture. He and Neal acquired a lease to a number of acres of land close to the previous Oakland Military Base, they usually applied for funding from the California Vitality Fee. 

After the fee rejected their utility, Juarez turned to a strong ally. Rob Bonta wrote a letter to the fee in 2014 recommending the venture, and workers from Bonta’s meeting workplace urged the board to fund Viridis. 

In 2015, a number of months after a choose discharged Juarez’s second chapter case, citing his failure to pay collectors, the fee awarded Viridis with $3.4 million in funding. By then, Juarez and his numerous corporations had been sued no less than 11 occasions.

Viridis in the end didn’t obtain the state funds, in keeping with the San Francisco Chronicle. The biofuel plant by no means moved ahead as new authorized issues for Juarez flared up. 

Round this time, his actual property practices have been attracting the eye of state regulators.

In December 2012, shortly after dropping his second race for Metropolis Council, Juarez was employed by a business landlord who owned a small warehouse in East Oakland to seek out him a tenant. Juarez discovered a person who needed to domesticate hashish within the constructing. In accordance with the phrases of Juarez’s settlement with the owner, he was to gather $3,500 in first month’s lease plus a $7,000 safety deposit from the tenant, and Juarez would get to maintain the primary month’s lease as his fee. 

However after receiving a tip, the California Department of Real Estate investigated and located that Juarez had ripped off the tenant by having him pay a $21,000 safety deposit and a dealer’s payment of $10,000 — and that Juarez gave the owner a examine for $7,000 and saved the remainder for himself. 

In 2015, Juarez voluntarily surrendered his actual property license. 

The Alameda County District Legal professional’s Workplace, then led by Nancy O’Malley, regarded into the case as properly, and the next yr charged Juarez with felony grand theft and forgery. It might be his first felony case, however not his final.

Juarez initially pleaded not responsible, and the DA later dropped the forgery cost and decreased the cost of grand theft to a misdemeanor, to which Juarez pleaded no contest. Juarez acquired a deferred entry of judgment, leaving his felony report clear, and he was ordered to pay the tenant $23,000. 

In February 2018, Juarez gave a $5,000 marketing campaign contribution to O’Malley, who was working for reelection. Juarez listed “actual property dealer” on the disclosure kind, despite the fact that he’d surrendered his license three years earlier. 

A would-be leisure mogul

The 2010s noticed Juarez launching one more profession, in nightlife and leisure.

This foray, too, would lead to a number of lawsuits — generally with Juarez because the plaintiff.

In 2015, he and two enterprise companions approached the house owners of a nightclub on Oakland’s Hegenberger Highway with a proposal to transform it right into a venue for Latin music and collectively launch an organization referred to as Latin Energy Presenta. The membership house owners, Michael and Gloria Govan, agreed, Juarez later claimed. One yr later, Juarez would sue the Govans, alongside along with his personal companions, claiming he’d invested $90,000 into the enterprise however had been frozen out of the enterprise as a result of he was uncomfortable with a slew of shady enterprise practices. 

Juarez additionally accused his different two companions of “improper relationships” with feminine workers and different unscrupulous behaviors, in keeping with a lawsuit he filed in Might 2016.

The Govans, who didn’t reply to a request for an interview, denied most of Juarez’s allegations, together with that he had contributed $90,000 to the corporate.

“Apparently, Juarez, who has an in depth and checkered previous, is understood for not following by way of on his enterprise guarantees and for leaving others holding the bag,” the Govans’ attorneys wrote. It’s not clear from courtroom data whether or not the case was resolved, and the Govans have been on the receiving finish of a pair different lawsuits within the years following Juarez’s.

One month after he filed the nightclub swimsuit, Juarez gained a second time period on the Alameda County Democratic Social gathering Central Committee. However his music promotion enterprise continued to run into bother.

In 2020 Juarez filed lawsuits in opposition to two distinguished Mexican rock bands — El Tri and Victimas del Physician Cerebro — who’d employed his Mario Juarez Leisure Firm because the promoter for his or her US excursions.

Juarez sued El Tri and their manufacturing firm that March, arguing he was owed a cancellation payment after various exhibits he’d booked fell by way of. El Tri and the band’s manufacturing firm, Lora Productions, denied they performed any function within the canceled exhibits, calling Juarez a “wannabe music promoter” who misled them and owed them a cancellation payment as a substitute.

On prime of neglecting his duties as promoter, the band claimed in a response to Juarez’s swimsuit, Juarez bounced a $20,000 examine for band journey and made an unauthorized buy utilizing the bank card of an actual property dealer.

That dealer, Manhaz Khazen, informed us she first met Juarez years in the past, when a mutual connection launched them at a rustic membership. On the time, Khazen was in search of a purchaser or new tenant for the historic Lake Merritt Lodge property, which she owned. Juarez, she mentioned, related her with O’Malley, the DA, who toured the property as a possible web site for a ladies’s shelter she was seeking to launch. (That plan didn’t pan out.)

Round this time, Juarez referred to as Khazen to ask for a donation for an artist he was representing, who was apparently stranded someplace and couldn’t afford to get to a music competition the place they have been scheduled to carry out. Khazen mentioned she’d purchase the musician a competition ticket, however Juarez insisted on utilizing her bank card quantity to deal with it himself. Realizing Juarez as a fellow dealer trusted with a “very credible entourage,” Khazen agreed.

“Subsequent factor I do know, American Categorical calls me and says, ‘Have you learnt you’re shopping for 53 tickets?’” Khazen recalled. “I mentioned, ‘What am I doing, bringing the entire symphony?’”

When she confronted Juarez, she mentioned, he blamed the mix-up on the journey agent. Khazen recalled telling Juarez she’d take him at his phrase and let it go.

Khazen described Juarez as an ultra-connected determine that nobody needed as an enemy.

“He can maneuver very simply,” she mentioned.

The El Tri case was dismissed in 2021. Courtroom data don’t point out whether or not a settlement was reached. A lawyer who represented Lora Productions mentioned he didn’t recall the small print of the case. 

“Subsequent factor I do know, American Categorical calls me and says, ‘Have you learnt you’re shopping for 53 tickets?’”

The identical month as he sued El Tri, Juarez sued Victimas del Physician Cerebro, this time for defamation and libel. Juarez claimed he booked 5 exhibits for the band, then offered the chance to deal with these exhibits to a publicist — who then did not promote tickets to the exhibits. When Juarez delivered this unhealthy information to the band, the musicians and their followers took to social media, excoriating Juarez and inspiring others to pile on. One defendant within the case referred to as Juarez, on social media, a “pseudo-promoter” who “swindled” the band. 

Juarez sought $2 million in damages, however the case was dismissed in 2023 after he failed to indicate as much as hearings.

It was throughout this era that Juarez’s relationship with Neal, his political patron and enterprise associate, soured.

Neal ran a nonprofit, the Oakland Neighborhood Fund, which is described in tax filings as sponsoring enterprise luncheons and administering grants, and he or she had introduced Juarez onto its board. In accordance with courtroom data in a 2021 felony case, Neal found in 2017 that Juarez had embezzled $45,000 from the nonprofit. 

“He got here to a board assembly someday and mentioned he had a approach for the nonprofit to make some cash,” Neal informed The Oaklandside. “We checked out the plan with our legal professional they usually mentioned it was okay.”

The plan was for the nonprofit to supply a small residence mortgage to a lady in Oakland, who would pay again the mortgage with curiosity. Nevertheless, when she paid it again, Juarez pocketed the funds for himself, a deputy district legal professional alleged within the 2021 embezzlement case in opposition to Juarez.

Neal mentioned she found the issue when she wrote the lady to ask why she hadn’t paid the mortgage again. “She despatched me again all this documentation displaying she’d paid Juarez,” Neal mentioned. “I really helpful she go to the district legal professional.”

In a letter to the borrower claiming the debt can be canceled, Juarez had signed his title and hooked up an expired actual property license quantity that belonged to a deceased agent, in keeping with the Oakland police officer who investigated the case.

Juarez’s legal professional, Charles Bonner, argued that Neal and her group have been falsely portraying themselves as victims; he sought to subpoena enterprise data from the Oakland Neighborhood Fund and Neal’s consulting enterprise. When Neal didn’t adjust to the subpoenas — she informed us she had a stroke and couldn’t reply — the DA’s workplace dismissed the case. Juarez, as soon as once more, emerged unscathed.

Juarez the ‘co-conspirator’

Between 2020 and 2022, Juarez used his Excessive Avenue rental property to host marketing campaign occasions for Councilmember Noel Gallo — Juarez’s former opponent — and for Assemblymember Mia Bonta. And he spent giant sums backing Sheng Thao’s marketing campaign for mayor. In November 2022, Juarez used an unbiased expenditure committee to spend over $110,000 on mailers attacking two of Thao’s opponents, Loren Taylor and Ignacio De La Fuente, whom he’d as soon as tried to unseat on the Metropolis Council. This expenditure would later be referenced in reference to Co-conspirator 1 within the federal corruption case in opposition to Thao.

However for all his magnanimity, he was allegedly jilting his landlords for his or her lease. 

The Excessive Avenue workplace area was owned by the Ye household, who have been first-generation immigrants. In 2017 the landlords tried to evict Juarez after discovering he had constructed a “high-end residence” contained in the constructing, although Juarez satisfied them it was only a showroom to advertise his actual property growth enterprise, in keeping with courtroom data. 

Then in 2021 the Ye household once more tried to present Juarez the boot, accusing him of illegally residing on the property — and failing to pay the lease. Juarez argued that he was “significantly impacted financially” through the pandemic and his household needed to secretly transfer into his workplace area to quarantine. He additionally argued that for the reason that workplace was now their main residence, they have been protected by Alameda County’s COVID-era eviction moratorium. 

The Ye household shredded Juarez’s story in a courtroom movement. He had an house in Fruitvale and, removed from being penniless, Juarez had spent practically $4.4 million to buy a property subsequent door.  “The declare that Defendant Juarez is a charity case is a hoax,” the Ye household’s’ legal professional, Robert Riggs, wrote in a courtroom submitting. “His household is properly related.” 

Riggs didn’t reply to an interview request. 

In February 2023, a choose ordered Juarez to return the property to his landlord and pay prices. The Ye household claimed that Juarez owed $268,000. 

In the meantime, an actual property deal that Juarez was engaged on subsequent to his landlord’s property would appeal to authorized scrutiny. 

In late 2021, an investor for a bunch referred to as Balboa LLC was approached about lending $3 million to Juarez. Juarez secured the mortgage, and later he additionally acquired a $250,000 mortgage from Stewart Chen, a neighborhood businessman and head of the Oakland Chinatown Enchancment Council. The issue, in keeping with an investigation by the district legal professional’s workplace, is that Juarez used the identical actual property as collateral for each loans — two properties he owned on East twelfth and Excessive streets. And Juarez didn’t inform Chen that his mortgage was second in line to be repaid if the property was foreclosed, that means he ran a giant threat of not being repaid.

These allegations are specified by an affidavit filed by David Bettencourt, an Alameda County District Legal professional’s inspector, who in July 2024 was in search of a search warrant to acquire Juarez’s banking data. Bettencourt had begun investigating after Chen submitted a criticism, which ended up with the DA’s actual property fraud unit. The DA’s workplace didn’t reply to an inquiry in regards to the standing of the investigation. 

In accordance with Bettencourt’s affidavit, when Chen confronted Juarez in regards to the collateral problem and lacking mortgage funds, Juarez responded by approaching Chen’s spouse and claiming, baselessly, that Chen had employed prostitutes. Chen described it as an act of intimidation to get Chen to cease “pressuring Juarez to make good on their mortgage.” 

One of many Balboa buyers additionally mentioned he’d been threatened, telling Bettencourt that Juarez mentioned he’d trigger “him lots of bother in Oakland” if he tried to foreclose on the property. 

Bettencourt famous in his affidavit that he had spoken with three people “who seem to have been victimized by Juarez, who in every case used strain to steer in any other case cautious buyers into funding him or persevering with to fund him, and in every case did not pay again or ship what was agreed upon.”

“It’s clear Juarez is susceptible to utilizing methods, deception, lies or omissions to not solely safe funds, however to stall the lenders after they start to ask for agreed on funds, then resorting to threatening language and habits when the lenders start dropping persistence and urgent for fee,” Bettencourt wrote. 

Bettencourt wrote that he believed an examination of Juarez’s financial institution accounts would flip up proof that Juarez dedicated two felonies by intentionally misstating info in regards to the steadiness of his checking account on a mortgage utility to deceive a possible lender.

Balboa foreclosed on the property in December 2022. Legal fees haven’t been filed. 

However that investigation touched on the problems on the coronary heart of the federal investigation that resulted within the FBI raid on Mayor Sheng Thao’s workplace in June of final yr. 

The Bettencourt affidavit particulars complaints by David and Andy Duong, who would later be named as Thao’s co-conspirators, that Juarez had bilked them out of an $800,000 funding in a housing enterprise that will construct low-cost container homes in Mexico for the Oakland inexpensive housing market.

The deal Juarez and the Duongs put collectively resulted in a brand new firm referred to as Evolutionary Properties. 

Federal prosecutors say Evolutionary Properties grew to become the centerpiece of an audacious conspiracy to bribe public officers in Oakland and past. In accordance with the indictment unsealed in January, the Duongs and Juarez believed that Thao, if elected, would grease the wheels for his or her housing firm to earn hundreds of thousands in metropolis contracts. In pursuit of this, prosecutors declare, Juarez arrange the committee that spent $110,000 on the mailers attacking Thao’s fundamental opponents within the race.

Thao gained — and issues quickly went downhill. 

Thao met with officers from Evolutionary Properties in 2023, in keeping with her appointment calendar. And Thao went on a authorities junket to Vietnam, paid for by a Vietnamese enterprise affiliation managed by the Duong household. However the metropolis council by no means publicly thought-about or voted on a contract for the corporate. Juarez and his group, together with Andy Duong, additionally pitched Santa Clara County Supervisor Cindy Chavez and Alameda County Supervisor Nate Miley, however nobody was biting, in keeping with public data. 

The corporate was turning into a cash pit. The Duongs invested roughly $1 million, a lot of it to pay for the development of dozens of container properties. However Juarez solely delivered a pair accomplished properties and was pressuring the Duongs to pay extra, in keeping with the affidavit. 

By 2024, Juarez was in dire monetary straits, in keeping with public data. He owed tens of hundreds in unpaid taxes to the state and federal authorities going again practically 20 years. In Might, a lender acquired an almost $33,000 judgment in opposition to him after he did not make funds on his 2012 BMW 7-Collection. 

That yr, Juarez was hit with one other felony investigation, this one associated to these assault mailers. The store that had printed Juarez’s assault mailers claimed Juarez’s checks had bounced, and the DA’s workplace, then led by Worth, charged him with fraud.

As was his behavior, Juarez lashed out, claiming that Worth was retaliating in opposition to him for turning down a requirement for $25,000 to combat the recall marketing campaign she was going through. Worth’s workplace addressed these claims in subsequent filings, and Worth later accused Juarez of being “a criminal.” In courtroom filings, Worth wrote that if she was recused from the case, the state ought to appoint a particular prosecutor and recuse Bonta, citing his “shut monetary and political ties” with Juarez. 

As strain mounted, Juarez’s relationship with the Duongs collapsed. In early Might 2024, Juarez had an altercation with the Duongs outdoors their workplace at 1211 Embarcadero St.

In a letter to the port fee, which owns the property housing the Duongs’ workplace, Juarez claimed that he confronted the Duongs about illegally locking him out of the Evolutionary Properties workplace, additionally situated within the constructing on Embarcadero. He claimed the Duongs summoned a bunch of people that beat him till he convulsed, and stole his watch and jewellery. 

In his personal letter to the Port, David Duong dismissed Juarez’s allegations as “weird and disturbing.” 

In mid-June, pictures have been fired outdoors of Juarez’s residence. He informed police he believed the assault was in response to his involvement in an unnamed investigation. 

Two weeks later, brokers from the FBI and the IRS raided the house the place Thao lived together with her associate Andre Jones. Brokers additionally hit properties belonging to David and Andy Duong. The raids set off political upheaval throughout town.

What drove them wouldn’t be made public till January 2025, when federal prosecutors unsealed an indictment, closely reliant on Co-conspirator 1’s claims, that accused the Duongs, Thao, and Jones of the brazen bribery scheme.

It’s a thriller why Thao and the Bontas related themselves with a person who’d wracked up 20 years of civil fits, felony indictments, and monetary judgments.

“He is aware of how one can weasel his approach into relationships,” Neal informed The Oaklandside. “I’ve tried to warn individuals to steer clear from him.”

Drake, the Democratic central committee member, mentioned she thinks the Duongs could have gotten into enterprise with Juarez, regardless of his historical past of bitter authorized disputes, due to what he supplied. “He will need to have informed them he had all types of ins with town administration,” she mentioned.

Lacabe, the opposite central committee member, mentioned she believes highly effective figures acquired near Juarez due to — not regardless of — the controversy that swirled round him. “He’s soiled, as individuals who play politics within the Bay Space are,” she mentioned.

De La Fuente mentioned he, too, suspects that many enterprise and political figures made alliances with Juarez as a result of he was somebody who would do unseemly issues. “They knew he was a criminal, however they needed to make use of the man,” he mentioned.

De La Fuente speculated that Juarez could have evaded felony convictions over time by turning into a precious supply for the police. “The FBI, they wish to get just a few elected individuals,” he mentioned. “They use everyone.”

David Duong and his attorneys now declare, in a current movement filed on Oct. 31, that the intensive historical past of civil and felony fraud accusations in opposition to Juarez may increase severe questions in regards to the veracity of the knowledge he handed to the feds.

In March, two months after the federal corruption indictment got here down, Juarez traveled to Dubai, posing in entrance of an artwork set up of big wings on the 124th degree of the Burj Khalifa.

“Nonetheless flying,” he wrote on X. “Some are about to hit turbulence.”