Mongols vow lawsuit to hold rooms at inn
This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press
Thursday, July 16, 2009.
By CRAIG CURRIER
Valley Press Staff Writer
LANCASTER – An attorney for the Mongols outlaw motorcycle club said they will sue to keep their rooms at the Desert Inn.
Called “domestic terrorists” by Mayor R. Rex Parris, who said the city will shut down the Desert Inn if necessary to keep their annual meeting out of Lancaster, Mongols members have agreed to pay more than $16,000 for 113 rooms, the banquet hall, restaurant and bar this weekend at the Desert Inn and also paid for 13 rooms at Lancaster’s Oxford Inn.
“The club’s constitutional rights are at stake by these threats made from the City of Lancaster, Mr. R. Rex Parris and Mr. David McEwen (city attorney),” attorney Albert Perez Jr. wrote to the Desert Inn’s general manager. “Club has also authorized my firm to proceed legally against any person and or individual who interferes in their right to associate, speech and contract.”
Desert Inn owner Hui Su said she had no idea she was doing business with members of the Mongols when she signed the contract to let them stay at the 144-room resort on Sierra Highway. Su said two men entered her hotel last week requesting a price quote for between 200 and 300 guests who would stay Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
They returned Monday and signed a contract with Su, renting the rooms for roughly $14,000 and agreeing to spend at least $2,500 at the hotel’s restaurant and bar during their stay. The restaurant and bar have been closing around 2 p.m. due to lack of business, Su said, but she plans to keep them open until 2 a.m. this weekend.
“They said they needed a place to hold a meeting,” Su said. “They wanted a place where they could eat, drink and sleep. They didn’t want to be driving after they drink.”
Su said the two men drove up in “nice cars,” and they paid her for the rooms with a cashier’s check.
“I’m not from here and all my friends are Oriental,” said Su, a native of Thailand. “I don’t even know what a gang is.
“They had tattoos, but many people have tattoos.”
Su said she found out the men were Mongols members about 30 minutes after they left Monday when sheriff’s deputies came to the hotel and asked if the men had been around.
She said the deputies told her the men had tried to enter into similar agreements with other hotels around the Antelope Valley.
Parris announced at a City Council meeting Tuesday night that city officials would do whatever it takes to keep the group from staying in Lancaster this weekend, including shutting down the hotel.
Parris repeated his warning Wednesday to a Los Angeles television station.
The Mongols “are domestic terrorists, and we treat them accordingly,” Parris told KABC-TV. “If anybody has any doubt about our resolve that they (the Desert Inn) will be out of business, they will be closed forever tomorrow. I said before, I do not care about the civil rights of gang members.”
Parris said city staff negotiated with Su to cancel the agreement, but she did not do so.
Su said it was not so easy. When she called the men to cancel, they responded with a letter from their lawyer, threatening to sue her if she backed out of the contract.
Perez, who represents the Mongols Nation Motorcycle Club Inc., provided to the Antelope Valley Press copies of two letters he sent to the Desert Inn and the Oxford Inn on Avenue K and 17th Street West.
In the letter, Perez threatens to file a lawsuit should either hotel breach the contract.
The letter to the Oxford Inn implies that hotel has already canceled the reservations. Oxford Inn General Manager Daniel Lawlor was unavailable for comment Wednesday night. A hotel employee said she knew nothing of either reservations or cancellation. The Oxford Inn has 173 rooms, according to the employee.
Business has been slow at the Desert Inn, according to Su. When she bought the hotel almost four years ago, she wanted to keep it free from the problems and reputations other Sierra Highway motels have.
The money earned from this weekend’s Mongols meeting would not have solved all her problems, Su said, but it certainly would help her in this tough economic climate.
“It’s not fair to business,” she said. “Why are we so slow? Because we try to keep everything OK here. The deputies who come here say, ‘We never have a problem with you.’ ”
She received a phone message from Lancaster City Manager Mark Bozigian late Tuesday, warning her of the city’s nuisance property ordinance, which imposes on the owner or occupant the cost for law enforcement services that are above those regularly scheduled because the excess cost is the result of a problem on her property.
“Like any other business or resident in the city, she would have to pay,” Bozigian said.
Though the group the Mongols was one of the largest she has ever agreed to serve, she did not ask questions about their background or livelihood. Rather, she just wanted to know what they would need, how they would pay and that they would follow all the rules and regulations of their contract, which includes reimbursement for any damages caused during their stay.
“We have church people that come every year,” Su said. “They take up 50 or 60 rooms. A couple weeks ago, we had the soccer tournament here. People always come in wanting to use the banquet room.”
Parris declined to discuss any potential code violations at the hotel that would lead to shutting it down and repeated his goal to rid Lancaster of gang members.
“My initial reaction would be to work with them,” Parris said. “The moment they decide to bring a gang into our community, they will no longer be in business.
“There’s zero tolerance for gangs in this community. That applies to the neighborhoods and the businesses, as well.”
Parris said he “deliberately kept himself in the dark” about the methods for closing the hotel’s doors because he did not want to compromise the work.
Deputy Michael Montesdeoca of the Lancaster Sheriff’s Station said the department is “adequately” staffed to handle the situation, should the gang members come this weekend.
Su said deputies, along with city officials, have visited the hotel several times this week, taking photos and asking questions.
Montesdeoca would not say why deputies are spending more time there than usual.
“If our deputies are gathering some kind of intelligence, I’m not going to jeopardize their safety,” he said.
Bozigian said city officials are working to make sure enough deputies are on patrol this weekend, especially with the Celebrate Downtown Lancaster festival taking place Friday evening on Lancaster Boulevard.
Deputy Robbie Royster of the Palmdale Sheriff’s Station said officials met Wednesday to discuss providing Lancaster with extra deputies for the weekend.
The Mongols have a history of activity in the Antelope Valley.
Federal agents raided houses on Oct. 21 in Lancaster, Antelope Acres and California City to conclude a three-year undercover investigation aimed at the motorcycle gang, which federal officials said was involved in drug trafficking, hate crimes against black people, firearms offenses and murder.
Among the Lancaster arrests was that of a suspect in a 2007 Lancaster bar slaying, in which a homeless man was beaten with pool cues and kicked, a federal investigator’s affidavit says.
In all, more than 60 people were arrested on an 86-count federal racketeering indictment, officials said. Dubbed “Operation Black Rain,” the investigation involved four male ATF agents supported by four female ATF agents who became members of the gang.
Authorities said the Mongols’ approximately 600 members include those affiliated or formerly affiliated with several Los Angeles County street gangs who use their Mongol membership to claim immunity from the collection of “taxes” imposed by the Mexican Mafia gang on drug sales.
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