Assembly leader dated figure in funeral scandal

sfgate.com ^ | 10/9/13 | Lance Williams

[GSWarrior]

For more than a year, Assembly Speaker John Pérez dated a Hollywood funeral director who faces fraud allegations in one of the biggest financial scandals to rock the U.S. funeral industry.

During their relationship, Pérez, a Los Angeles Democrat, mixed political business with his personal life in ways that showed poor judgment, ethics experts say. A Pérez spokesman said the lawmaker conducted himself appropriately during a casual dating relationship.

Tyler Cassity, proprietor of a boutique cemetery called Hollywood Forever as well as a Mill Valley cemetery, and defendant in a $600 million fraud lawsuit in his native Missouri, accompanied Pérez to a series of high-profile public events.

Meanwhile, in St. Louis, Cassity, his parents and his older brother are defendants in a 2009 lawsuit that contends they looted millions of dollars from trust accounts and insurance policies that were supposed to be set aside to pay for customers' funerals.

[Lonely Bull]

And just why do you suppose he was dating a funeral director, hmmmm?

Even his dating was political; he imagined that a funeral director would have especial insights about some of the Democrats' most faithful supporters.

[Lonely Bull]

Even his dating was political; he imagined that a funeral director would have especial insights about some of the Democrats' most faithful supporters.

Moreover, one with serious ethical problems would have especial insights about some of the Democrats' other most faithful supporters.