Posted on 05/14/2003 4:48:59 PM PDT by John Jorsett
FBI agents accompanied by San Diego police raided the offices of three San Diego City Council members shortly before 1 p.m. Wednesday.
Search warrants were served at the offices of Councilmen Ralph Inzunza, Charles Lewis and Michael Zucchet, U.S. Attorney Carol Lam said at a news conference
The probe may involve campaign contributions, sources close to the investigation told The San Diego Union-Tribune.
No charges have been filed, FBI Agent Jan Caldwell said in a brief statement.
"We'll try to wrap up the investigation as expeditiously as possible," Caldwell said.
The FBI also served a search warrant at Cheetahs, a strip club on Clairemont Mesa Boulevard, according to television news reports.
Mayor Dick Murphy held a brief news conference to announce that federal agents told him his office is not a subject of the investigation.
"I am referring all other questions to the office of the U.S. attorney," Murphy said.
A spokesman for the San Diego City Attorney's Office, Maria Velasquez, said the agents sealed off the 10th floor offices of the City Council members from the public.
Council aides who worked on the floor were allowed to enter and leave but the doors to a public reception area were closed.
Several people pulling carts of equipment with labels indicating that it contained computer forensic equipment entered the council offices around 2 p.m. without saying anything.
Inzunza:
Lewis:
Zucchet:
A fact conveniently left out of the article... rest assured, that if they were Republicans, the article would have had that fact in the headline.
...Which explains the search warrent also being served on the strip club...
Now it is getting interesting!
Associated Press via The Reno Gazette Journal.Public corruption, weapons and drugs, hidden club ownerships...sounds like Rats alright.5/14/2003 04:45 pm FBI agents on Wednesday raided the offices of three San Diego City Council members, along with strip clubs in San Diego and Las Vegas and a home in southern Nevada as part of a public corruption probe.
U.S. Attorney Carol Lam said the FBI worked with San Diego police in searching the offices of City Council member and Deputy Mayor Ralph Inzunza, and council members Charles Lewis and Michael Zucchet. Officials also searched the Cheetah's nightclub in San Diego, she said.
In Las Vegas, agents entered two clubs _ Cheetah's and Jaguars _ along with Galardi Enterprises, an office atop a bar and pool hall in downtown Las Vegas.
Lam declined to specify the nature of the investigation because it was ongoing. No charges were filed, she said. Authorities in Las Vegas and San Diego said no arrests were made.
A call to Inzunza's office was not immediately returned Wednesday. Calls to the offices of Lewis and Zucchet rang unanswered. Messages left at the homes of Inzunza and Zucchet also were not returned.
A home phone number for Lewis could not be determined.
San Diego Mayor Dick Murphy issued a statement saying his office was not a target of the investigation.
Cheetah's operates clubs in Las Vegas and San Diego. A dancer at the Las Vegas club, Nada Madanat, 22, said she was in the dressing room when agents entered with guns drawn, saying they were looking for weapons and drugs.
Bob Loosle, an FBI supervisory agent in Las Vegas, said the warrants were part of an investigation that had been going on for two years.
He said the raid at the two Las Vegas clubs were not related to a raid in February at the Crazy Horse Too Gentlemen's Club in Las Vegas.
The lawyer for Crazy Horse owner Rick Rizzolo said agents in that case seized records dating to 1995, searched lockers and asked dancers about allegations of drug dealing and hidden club ownership.
connect the dots..
FBI raids strip clubs
FBI agents this afternoon raided two Las Vegas strip clubs owned by Mike Galardi. The raids at Cheetah's and Jaguars were conducted at the same time as searches on Galardi's Las Vegas business headquarters, a private residence and several locations in San Diego. FBI agents said the raids are not related to the February raid of the Crazy Horse Too.
Are you familiar with this spot...:-)
Ah, my friend "The Great Razooly". I knew him when he had a Polish last name I couldn't pronounce let alone spell...
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