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Nine demands for information and documents have been sent to various players in the bungled real estate deal

Print An investigator for the San Diego City Attorney’s Office and his wife are accused of embezzling hundreds of thousands of dollars from the longtime owner of the former Sempra Energy headquarters at 101 Ash St., according to a civil lawsuit winding through Superior Court. Keith Sears and his wife, Susan, are co-defendants in an amended complaint filed in February by Sandor Shapery, the San Diego investor who formerly owned the 19-story high-rise now at the center of a sweeping political scandal and a spate of litigation. Susan Sears previously worked as a bookkeeper for Shapery Enterpri...

Print The ill-fated decision to sign a lease-to-own deal for the former Sempra Energy headquarters at 101 Ash St. continues to cost the city of San Diego big chunks of public funding. At the recommendation of Mayor Todd Gloria, the San Diego City Council voted Tuesday to pay more than $1.8 million to settle legal claims filed by two companies hired to help renovate the vacant 19-story high rise. The decision came on a 6-3 vote, with Councilmembers Sean Elo-Rivera, Vivian Moreno and Monica Montgomery Steppe opposed. “The public deserves a city government they can trust,” Elo-Rivera said ju...

Editor-at-Large San Diego City Attorney Mara Elliott is misleading the public by refusing to release potentially damning parts of a forensic report that reviewed the 101 Ash Street building deal, even after the report was promised to be an independent and comprehensive analysis of what has now become one of the City’s worst financial debacles in its history. The “forensic analysis” was touted as an in-depth investigation of all aspects of, and all departments and personnel involved in, the $128 million purchase and $30 million renovation of the building after the 19-story tower had to b...

Arturo Editor-at-Large Over 1,000 City of San Diego employees were moved into the 101 Ash Street building in December 2019 and January 2020 without final building inspections that would have required that all of the fire life safety equipment be certified to be working, and after City leaders were warned by the general contractor that the systems were not operable, but City staff then misrepresented the building status to the press, the public, and even the San Diego Ethics Commission. The building, which served as the corporate headquaters of San Diego Gas & Electric and later its parent com...