FBI, IRS raid Seeno office

(NV) Discovery Homes, Albert D. Seeno Construction Company, West Coast Home Builders, Seeno family firms, under investigation for crimes.

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FBI, IRS raid Seeno office
Martinez Seeno housing developments include Chateau Ridge near Hidden Lakes Park.

By Donna Beth Weilenman

Benicia Herald
March 3, 2010
Two Concord offices of the Seeno family of developers were searched and shuttered by agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Internal Revenue Service’s criminal investigation division and the Secret Service early Thursday.

The agents executed sealed warrants, said Arlette Lee, information officer for the IRS. “I don’t have any other information,” she said.

Secret Service Agent Charles White confirmed that the FBI was leading the investigation. “We in the Secret Service work with other agencies on financial kinds of investigations,” he said.

Repeated calls to the FBI were not returned.

Seeno attorney William Goodman told reporters his clients are cooperating with the FBI. By 2:30 p.m. Thursday, the main and side doors of Albert D. Seeno Construction Company at 4021 Port Chicago Highway in Concord were blocked with yellow police tape.

Also raided was the office of Discovery Homes, also a Seeno firm, at 4061 Port Chicago Highway.

A middle-aged man at the building who did not identify himself asked our reporters to leave the Seeno Construction Company parking lot, saying it was private property. “We have been accommodating to the media all day, but I have been advised to ask the media to move,” the man said, declining to give his name.

On Friday, Mayor Rob Schroder said that because Seeno and Discovery Builders had not sought to build developments in Martinez in recent history, he was not familiar with the company’s current woes. When asked if he had ever accepted campaign contributions from Seeno, he replied, “not that I’m aware of.”

Benicia Mayor Elizabeth Patterson, who has had close contact with the Seeno family through the developers’ proposed business park project on 527 acres in Benicia, said, “This isn’t the first time Seeno has been in trouble with the law. They have had to pay millions of dollars in fines for filling wetlands and endangered species violation. It’s a pattern.”

The business park project, one of the hot topics during the November 2009 Benicia election, was stalled during conflicts with the city.

“I heard statements from Albert III,” Patterson said of Benicia meetings during which the younger Seeno spoke. “They all protested they were good business people and didn’t want their integrity questioned.”

Patterson had no comment about Thursday’s raid. “I think it would be more prudent to let the law do its job,” she said.

Concerning the impact the raid might have on the business park’s development, Benicia Vice Mayor Alan Schwartzman said, “If it’s Discovery Builders who are the ones [targeted], there will be issues.”

The family of developers, which started in 1938 with the late Albert Seeno and continues with his sons Tommy and Albert Jr. and grandson Albert III, has been cited for environmental violations several times since 1996.

Albert D. Seeno Construction Company and the state reached a $3 million settlement after the state Department of Fish and Game uncovered permit violations when grading in the Mira Vista subdivision in Antioch destroyed ponds and several waterways. Seeno’s West Coast Home Builders was fined $1 million after pleading guilty to violating the federal Endangered Species Act for killing red-legged frogs and deliberate destruction of a frog habitat while building in the San Marco subdivision in Pittsburg. Pittsburg’s mayor, Sal Evola, is a family member who works for Discovery.

In 2004, a Gaming Control Board investigated Seeno Jr., his brother David and Seeno III after a complaint was filed about their alleged associations with convicted felons. Seeno Jr. was fined $775,000 by the Nevada Gaming Commission for alleged ties to members of the Hell’s Angels, and Seeno III was fined $25,000.

That same year, Nevada gaming regulators said Seeno III was a suitable beneficiary of interests in corporations that own five Nevada casinos, including Wendover Casinos and Peppermill Casinos, and his father has been a part owner of the Rainbow Club and Casino in Henderson, the Peppermill in Reno, Western Village in Sparks and two Wendover casinos.

Specializing in affordable housing, the developers have built, among their projects, Brighton Station and Portofino Estates, Brentwood; Creekside Landing, Chico; Estates at Black Diamond, Antioch; Lawlor Estates, Valencia at San Marco and Veranda at San Marco in Pittsburg, and Vista la Terraza in Vallejo. They also have built Portico at North Village and Estuary at North Village in Vacaville; Serenade and Collection at Paradise in Fairfield; and Monarch Ranch in Oakley.

On the Seeno Homes Web site, the company claims to have built three housing developments in Martinez: Chateau Ridge, Pineview and Rancho Las Juntas. Chateau Ridge is a development built in the mid-to-late ‘80s in the Hidden Lake neighborhood on the southern border of Martinez and Pleasant Hill. However, the exact locations of Pineview and Rancho Las Juntas are unclear. No information on the developments could be found online, and calls to Seeno and Discovery Builders requesting the locations were unanswered.

When asked about the two Martinez Seeno developments, Mayor Rob Schroder said he had never heard of them.

Additional reporting by Greta Mart.

http://www.martinezgazette.com/news/story/i659/2010/03/03/fbi-irs-raid-s...