A California judge on Friday refused to dismiss a check fraud case tied to an Oakland businessman at the center of a federal bribery and corruption investigation into former Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao.
Judge Thomas Reardon said he decided to hold off on making a decision until Alameda County’s new district attorney, Ursula Jones Dickson, is sworn in later this month.
The move shocked both the lawyer of the political operative and the prosecutor, who argued the case should be dropped.
The grand theft charge against Mario Juarez had been filed under District Attorney Pamela Price, who was recalled in November.
Juarez, who pleaded not guilty, has been accused of bouncing checks that paid for election mailers that benefited Thao, Oakland’s recently indicted former mayor. Federal prosecutors have linked the flyers to a larger scheme tied to Thao. Federal prosecutors claim Thao and her boyfriend Andre Jones accepted bribes from California Waste Solutions executives David and Andy Duong in exchange for favorable treatment with their business ventures that totaled millions in city contracts.
The Duongs have denied the allegations.
Reardon chose to delay his decision after protests from the man whose business received the bad checks.
Last year, Juarez was charged with writing bad checks worth $53,000 for attack ad mailers against Thao’s 2022 mayoral competitors. Samari Johnson, the owner of the printing company Butterfly Direct Marketing, filed a police report against Juarez, saying he left him with bills he couldn’t pay because the checks bounced.
“This case is of significant importance to me and my small business,” Johnson said in a letter to the court. “Dismissing the case would allow a criminal to avoid accountability for his actions.”
But the case hasn’t been cut and dry.
Juarez publicly claimed Price had filed charges against him as retaliation after he refused to donate $25,000 to her campaign.
She has denied the allegations.
His public defender at the time also claimed Price had acted suspiciously and added sentencing enhancements to a murder case he was defending as payback for not speaking out against the recall campaign against her.
The DA’s office has admitted that the case against Juarez was not prosecuted per usual and received special “attention” from Price.
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Friday’s development is just the latest twist in a complicated, layered, yearslong corruption scandal that has engulfed Alameda County, its county seat, Oakland, and led to the ousting of its mayor and a district attorney.
Dickson, who has promised to root out corruption and be tougher on crime, will be sworn in Feb. 18. Reardon has given her until Feb. 21 to review the matter.
