No Charges in Infamous LA Council Recording Case

It caused an international incident – a trio of Los Angeles City councilmembers having a rather racial stereotype filled chat with a local union leader as to how best to carve up the city to decrease the number of black elected officials.

The world got to see behind the ever-so-fragile “diversity” mask LA pols put on and heard that, no matter the previous public happy talk, politics is politics and it’s nasty.

It’s illegal in California to record a conversation without the other person’s consent, but that is exactly what happened when then-Council President Nury Martinez, Councilmembers Kevin de Leon and Gil Cedillo had a bit of a chin wag with Los Angeles County Federation of Labor President Ron Herrera in late 2022.

The recording featured some rather nasty commentary about other council members, the notoriously woke Mike Bonin of Venice Beach included.  In fact, Martinez averred that Bonin treated his adopted black son as a political accessory, much like women treat their handbags.

Even though it was the silly and awful racism that made international news, the point of the meeting was somehow even worse:  how to re-district the city council to add more Hispanic members and make sure there are fewer black members.

It was publicly revealed in July, 2023 that the, um, alleged, meeting recorder/leakers worked at the union, where the chat occurred. They were identified as Santos Leon, the former Director of Finance for the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, and another employee at the union, Karla Vasquez. 

The LAPD, after investigating the case, referred the matter for prosecution to LA District Attorney George Gascon. His team looked at the issue and – even though they found that “(T)he evidence indicates that a crime was committed,” Gascon declined to file any charges and referred to case to LA City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto.

Earlier this week, her office said they would not be pursuing any charges against Leon and/or Vasquez (both of whom have denied the allegations), saying there was insufficient evidence to pursue wiretapping charges.

Martinez and Ferrera both resigned their positions in the wake of the tape being released – Cedillo was already on his way off the council but de Leon ignored calls for his resignation and has a very good chance of getting re-elected in a few weeks.

One can assume Nury is kicking herself for resigning.

But is the fact that no one will be charged with anything – even though the recording is in and of itself evidence of a crime – at all surprising?

In the slimy world of the LA politics, it is not at all a surprise.  Despite the racist window dressing, the tape was really about a closed-door private meeting amongst some of the most powerful people in the city trying to figure out how to lessen black representation on the council and, thereby, raising Hispanic representation.

20% of the council is black and about 8.5% of the city’s population is back;  half of the city is Hispanic but only – that is if you actually think it matters and do not see people as people but only as groups to be manipulated –  one-third of the council is Hispanic.

Heaven forfend – it’s not balanced!

Digging further into the matter and actually bringing any kind of charges against whomever would have opened a very wiggly can of political worms for the city’s power structure – imagine the stuff that could come out at trial?

So even though the incident made international news, in the end there is nothing.

There was once sound and fury – now the tape is making a very tiny “plunk” sound in a very big, very deep, very corrupt lake.