All charges dropped for seven of nine San Jacinto school board and city council members

SAN JACINTO - Seven of the nine developers, school board and city council members caught up in an purported political corruption scandal in San Jacinto will apparently all charges dropped, it was reported today

''Mere association does not a conspiracy make,'' said Riverside County Superior Court Judge Michele Levine. The defendants faced ''a hodgepodge of acts and statements by others" unknown to them, the judge said.

The Riverside Press-Enterprise reported that the judge has made a tentative ruling that there is insufficient evidence that the people were anything other than mere acquaintances, and there was no evidence of a plot among the seven defendants to engage in illegal acts such as hiding repayments of illicit political contributions.

In 2009, San Jacinto was rocked by a 155-count indictment that named four former San Jacinto City Council members, developers, business associates and one former member of the San Jacinto Unified School District board.

On Friday, the judge indicated she will dismiss charges against three former San Jacinto councilmen: John Mansperger, James Potts, and Dale Stubblefield. Also indicted were former school board member Nancy Ayres and businessmen Robert Osborne, Byron Ellison and Scott Shaull. The defendants were indicted in November 2009.

The indictment included 56 felony and 99 misdemeanor charges, including bribery, money laundering, perjury, tax fraud, and filing false government documents.

Although conspiracy charges were tentatively dismissed against those seven defendants, Levine said it was a different matter for developer Stephen Holgate and former San Jacinto city councilman and state Assembly candidate Jim Ayres, the husband of Nancy Ayres. Levine said there was grand jury testimony of communication and coordination between the two, the Press-Enterprise reported.

Prosecutors allege Ayers' campaign received hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegal contributions, utilizing a network of friends, family and unknowing accomplices, who funneled money into his campaign using laundered assets. The charges were the result of a county investigation presented to a Grand Jury, which under California law is allowed to hear purported evidence from prosecutors without the defendants' knowledge or rebuttal.

The indictment alleged Holgate was the source of more than $81,000 in loans Ayres claimed he made to his own campaign in May and June 2006 and another $21,000 in August, September and October of the same year. Investigators also claimed Ayres sold Shaull a home above market price, which resulted in almost a gift of almost $90,000 to Ayres, the Press-Enterprise reported

Dismissal of the conspiracy counts could knock the props out from the remaining charges in the case, as it would be impossible for a defendant to commit conspiracy if there was no crime committed by the alleged other parties.

Prosecutors, defense attorneys, and Judge Levine said they could not immediately tell which remaining charges might be affected by the tentative decision to dismiss the seven defendants. Levine told supervising deputy district attorney Deborah Lucky to file papers that line up each count, defendant, and alleged act to clarify the matter, the Press-Enterprise reported.

A final ruling was expected in May.