Greater Orange News Service

eLECTION Watch 2012

Court rules Jon Dumitru cannot use “businessman” on ballot

Orange Councilwomen Tita Smith was handed a major court victory in her bid for Orange Mayor. Smith had gone to court against Neal Kelly, Orange County Registrar of Voters to have her opponent, Orange Councilman Jon Dumitru, change his ballot designation. Dumitru, who works for the Orange County Fire Authority as a communications dispatcher, had tried to list his ballot designation in the November Orange Mayor’s race as “businessman”. Dumitru filed a respond to Smith's court action to try and prove that he is a “consultant” and he buys and sells contents of abandoned storage lockers, which makes him a "businessman". After receiving Smith's rebuttal response, the judge ruled in Smith's favor, forcing the OC Registrar not to accept Dumitru's designation as a "buisnessman". Instead, Dumitru, like Smith, will only have his city title as his designation: "Orange City Councilman".

Filing in Orange County Superior Court, Smith’s legal team answered Dumitru’s opposition to having the designation removed with a scathing six page response challenging the Councilman's evidence and truthfulness. In the Introduction of the court filed response to Dumitru that Orange Net News obtained, Smith’s legal team writes:

“Dumitru’s opposition to the petition is an insult to real businesspeople. His flimsy evidence is a gross distortion of the words “livelihood”, “principal” and “primary”. Sporadic, isolated, trivial efforts at freelance consulting do not constitute a “current principal profession, vocation, or occupation of the candidate”, particularly when Dumitru has a real job as a fire dispatcher. Dumitru’s attempt to bootstrap these sporadic efforts into “businessman” are grossly misleading to the voters of Orange, who picture something vastly different of a real businessman.

More seriously (when considering Dumitru is currently an elected official and holds a public trust), Dumitru has committed perjury or misled the court in two respects. First his Form 700s, sworn under penalty of perjury, are inconstant with his sworn declaration in this case. Second, he out-and-out misled this court with his business license.

Once Dumitru’s declaration is fully analyzed, it will be seen that the attempt to use “businessman” is nothing more than a political ploy to gain votes at the expense of the truth.”

In the second section of the response titled “2. Dumitru’s alleged Activities Do Not Amount to An Occupation or Vocation.” Smith’s team disputes Dumitru’s claim of being a consultant for a “colleague” noting that he does not name the “colleague” nor the business or political interest. The response states the evidence of four checks for $350 each Dumitru presented as evidence of pay “do not identify the payor or the purpose of the checks” and notes the lack of any contract connected to the checks make it impossible to know the real purpose of the checks:

“The secretive nature of his declaration suggests that he is hiding the real purpose of these payments. He did not report the income on his most recent From 700 as business income, again suggesting that something is afoot...”

The section concludes with a quote from an Orange County Register January 5, 2012 article on Dumitru’s storage buying “ ‘It’s just a hobby’ Dumitru stated, ‘Its kind of cool to see what is hidden inside” noting that Secretary of State regulations exclude hobbies from ballot designations. They counter Dumitru’s claims that his storage hobby has developed into something more since January stating that there is nothing in his evidence showing anything since March 2012 regarding storage buying. The section ends stating:
“Taken together this evidence does not come close to making Dumitru a businessman”.

The third Section of Smith’s team’s response is;
“3. Dumitru’s Sworn Testimony Is Inconsistent With the Truth” Starting with “to often political people cross the line of ethical behavior because they believe the ends justify the means” the section states that Dumitru’s court papers justifying trying to use “businessman” have “brought him perilously close to perjury, and clearly caused him to mislead the court”.
Smith’s team contended that Dumitru’s explanations of his business are not reconciled with his Form 700 filings.

Also in this section, Smith’s legal team makes a second point:

“Second, Dumitru lied in his declaration to the court in this case about his business license”.

The court documents state that Councilwomen Tita Smith’s campaign checked the City of Orange business license records and filed court documents on August 21st, reporting that “Dumitru had no business license”. Smith’s side further states that Dumitru then filed a declaration under penalty of perjury on August 25th that stated the “Petitioner’s [Smith] statement that I do not hold a valid business license is patently false”. Smith’s response then reports that Dumitru got a business license on August 23rd (two days after the Smith’s court filing) and tried to leave the impression that the Councilman had a license when Smith filed her declaration to the court.

Smith’s documents to the court include a sworn declaration from City of Orange custodian of Business Licenses declaring that Councilman Dumitru applied for and was issued a business license on August 23, 2012 and he did not have any business license prior to that date. The court documents also include a copy of the application for the Orange Business License stamp dated August 23, 2012. The license application signed by Dumitru lists Councilman Denis Bilodeau as the emergency contact.


Smith’s response was filed with the court and also sent to Councilman Dumitru’s attorney Steve Sheldon. Shelton was a partner in the Peralta Apartment Partners, one of three developers that sought the contract to develop the Orange Unified Peralta School Site. Orange Unified Trustee Dr. Alexia Deligianni, a political ally and close friend of Dumitru moved to approve the Peralta Apartment Partners as the site developers at the July 2012 OUSD School Board Meeting (see LINK below). Her motion died for lack of a second. After that meeting, Dumitru was waiting for Deligianni outside the OUSD Board Room. When Orange Net News reported that Dumitru was waiting outside, he made a comment on the posted story ( see link below) that he was waiting for Deligianni to have her sign his nomination papers. (CLICK ON: DELIGIANI)

It is not the first controversy for Dumitru:

CLICK ON: DUMITRU Controversy

MORE DUMITRU

And...MORE


PLUS MORE

Labels: ballot, court, Jon Dumitru