David C. Farmer, Successor-Trustee vs. Harmon
(Formerly Woo vs. Harmon & Nicholson vs. Harmon)
U.S. District Court For the District of Hawaii
Judges: David A. Ezra; Kevin S. Chang
—
DEFENDANT’S WITNESS
Address to be determined.
President, Tesoro Hawaii; President & CEO, Hawaii Dental Services (HDS); Chair, University of Hawaii Foundation Board of Trustees; Trustee, The Nature Conservancy; Director, First Hawaiian Bank; Director, First Insurance Company of Hawaii, Inc.; William S. Richardson School of Law graduate, 1979 (classmate of former Bishop Estate trustee Gerard A. Jervis and Judge Reynaldo D. Graulty); wife of Judge Barry Kurren.
Tesoro Hawaii leases commercial properties from Kamehameha Schools, and may supply petroleum products to Kamehameha’s subsidiary, Paradise Petroleum, dba Alii Petroleum.
* * * * *
THE FAYE KURREN PHOTO GALLERY
http://www.hawaii.edu/malamalama/2006/05/alumni.html
* * * * *
NEW DISCOVERY (08-15-08): Undisclosed conflicts of interests between Senator Dan Inouye, Senator Ted Stevens, VECO Corporation, George W. Bush, John McCain, Dick Cheney, Halliburton, Shell Oil, Barack Obama, Mark Bennett, Linda Lingle, Tesoro Petroleum, Faye Kurren, Judge Barry Kurren, Enron, etc.:
December 6, 1996
ENRON and Shell Win Bid in
Capitalization of YPFB's
Transportation Segment
LA PAZ, BOLIVIA – Enron Development Corp. and Shell International Gas Ltd. announced today that the government of Bolivia has named the companies the successful capitalizing company for the transportation segment of the state oil and gas company, Yacimientos Petroliferos...
Business Wire
~ ~ ~
March 30, 1998
The following is an excerpt from a 10-K SEC Filing, filed by TESORO PETROLEUM CORP /NEW/ on 3/30/1998:
ACCESS TO NEW MARKETS
A lack of market access has constrained natural gas production in Bolivia. With little internal gas demand, all of the Company's Bolivian natural gas production is sold under contract to the Bolivian government for export to Argentina.
Major developments in South America indicate that new markets will open for the Company's production. Construction of a new 1,900-mile pipeline that will link Bolivia's extensive gas reserves with markets in Brazil commenced in 1997 and is expected to be operational in early 1999.
The owners of the new pipeline include Petrobras (the Brazilian state oil company), other Brazilian investors, Enron Corp., Shell International Gas Ltd., British Gas PLC, El Paso Energy Corp., BHP, and Bolivian pension funds. When completed, the new pipeline will have a capacity of approximately 1 billion cubic feet ("Bcf") per day.
For more, see...
Vultures Up to their Necks in Tesoro Petroleum
~ ~ ~
NEW DISCOVERY (08-01-08): Undisclosed conflicts of interests between Senator Dan Inouye, Senator Ted Stevens, VECO Corporation, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Halliburton, Tesoro Petroleum, Faye Kurren, Judge Barry Kurren, etc.:
July 30, 2008
Alaska Sen. Stevens indicted;
'I am innocent'
By LISA DEMER, RICHARD MAUER and ERIKA BOLSTAD
Anchorage Daily News
A federal grand jury in Washington, D.C., indicted long-term U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens Tuesday on seven counts of filing false financial disclosures, each a felony charge that carries a penalty of five years in prison and an unspecified fine.
With the indictment, Stevens, an icon in Alaska politics, becomes by far the most powerful politician charged in the broad, four-year federal investigation into public corruption in the state. To date, three state legislators, a high-level official in Gov. Frank Murkowski's administration, two businessmen and a lobbyist have been convicted, while two legislators are awaiting trial.
Stevens said he will fight to save himself and his long career.
"I am innocent of these charges and intend to prove that," he said in a prepared statement. "I have proudly served this nation and Alaska for over 50 years."
At a news conference in Washington to announce the indictment, Matthew Friedrich, acting assistant attorney general for the Justice Department's criminal division, said Stevens would be allowed to turn himself in. Stevens' attorney, Brendan Sullivan of Washington, was notified of the indictment Tuesday morning shortly before it became public, Friedrich said.
'THINGS OF VALUE'
The seven-count indictment charges Stevens with making false statements by failing to disclose "things of value" he received from Veco Corp., the now-defunct Alaska-based oil services and construction company, and from its chairman, Bill Allen, in a scheme that stretched over eight years.
At the same time, according to the indictment, Allen and other Veco employees asked Stevens to intervene on their behalf with the government, and Stevens sometimes obliged.
Stevens received substantial benefits from his relationship with Veco that he never disclosed, the indictment charged: improvements to his home in Girdwood; an automobile exchange in which he received a new Land Rover worth far more than his 35-year-old Mustang; and household appliances.
The federal Ethics in Government Act requires all senators to file financial disclosure statements detailing their transactions during the previous calendar year, including the disclosure of gifts above a specified value and all liabilities greater than $10,000.
At the news conference, Friedrich said the case involved false disclosures, not bribery, and no specific actions by Stevens in return for gifts were charged, even though the indictment mentioned some Veco requests and the favorable responses by Stevens and his staff.
Some of the solicitations were made directly to Stevens and included requests for help by Veco on its international projects in Pakistan and Russia; requests for federal grants and contracts, including National Science Foundation contracts worth nearly $200 million; and assistance with efforts to construct a natural gas pipeline from Alaska's North Slope.
The indictment comes just as Stevens is in the political fight of his life to win a seventh term. The fallout was immediate: Under Republican rules governing indicted senators, he had to step aside from two key committee positions he earned through longevity -- his co-chairmanship of the Commerce Committee, which oversees fishing and telecommunications, and his ranking position on the defense appropriations subcommittee, from which he has sent millions in earmarks to Alaska.
Even with his famed clout in Washington at least temporarily diminished, Stevens vowed to continue his campaign. His presumptive Democratic opponent, Anchorage Mayor Mark Begich, wouldn't answer questions about Stevens' indictment.
YEAR AFTER GIRDWOOD RAID
Friedrich said the Justice Department followed its own rules in seeking an indictment when the evidence was complete and sufficient to bring charges. The political calendar wasn't considered, he said.
Allen, Veco's former chief executive, and Rick Smith, the company's former vice president of community affairs and government relations, pleaded guilty May 7, 2007, to providing more than $400,000 in corrupt payments to public officials from Alaska. Allen and Smith are cooperating and have been key witnesses in two trials so far.
Back then, there were no direct references in the Allen and Smith charges to gifts they provided to Stevens, though they admitted making corrupt payments of $243,250 over five years to Stevens' son Ben, once president of the Alaska Senate. Ben Stevens has not been charged and has denied wrongdoing.
The charges against Ted Stevens come almost exactly a year after an FBI and IRS raid on Stevens' home in Girdwood, the first time those agencies had ever raided the home of a sitting U.S. senator. At the time the agents documented the renovations made in 2000 that were overseen by Allen and managed by his employees and contractors. The renovations doubled the size of the home.
Stevens has refused to discuss the investigation, except to say he paid every bill he received connected to the renovation. He has refused to elaborate about whether that answer implied he knew of work on the house for which he wasn't billed.
The indictment said Stevens made "multiple false representations" to reporters, his friends and his staff about what he received from Veco and Allen. While it's no crime for an official to lie to the media, prosecutors charged that those statements were part of his long-term effort to conceal Veco's gifts and benefits.
MORE THAN $200,000 ON RENOVATIONS
From the summer of 2000 to about December 2001, Veco spent more than $200,000 on the Girdwood renovations, including materials, labor and architectural design, the indictment says. Much of that effort has already been the subject of extensive media coverage based on interviews with contractors, ex-Veco employees and Girdwood residents who witnessed the work.
For instance, Veco and Stevens hired a construction firm, identified only as "Construction Firm A" in the indictment, for the renovation project. The company matches the description of Christensen Builders of Anchorage, whose president, Augie Paone, told the Daily News in May 2007 that he was hired by Veco but sent invoices to Stevens and that Stevens paid by personal check from a new account.
The charges say Stevens never paid Veco anything for the materials or labor provided by Veco, its employees and contractors but clearly knew that Veco did a lot of the work.
Paone said he fully cooperated with the government. The indictment echoes his assertions in the interview, adding that Construction Firm A focused on carpentry and finish work, and Veco employees did much more.
PRAISE FOR VECO WORKERS
In an e-mail to Allen Sept. 24, 2000, Stevens was full of praise for Veco and its employees, according to the indictment. "We've never worked with a man so easy to get along with as (unnamed Veco employee). Plus, everyone who's seen the place wants to know who has done the things he's done. ... You and (Person A) have been the spark plugs, and we are really pleased with all you have done. hope to see you and the chalet soon. best teds." The indictment goes much further than what was previously known and reveals that maintenance on the house extended into 2006. When something went awry, the charges say, Stevens asked Veco for help much as someone else might call a plumber.
By 2006, the concealed "things of value" topped $250,000.
The indictment has no reference to whether the government intercepted calls made to Stevens from any of Allen's or Smith's phones that were wiretapped under court order starting in 2005. Once Allen agreed to plead guilty, on Aug. 30, 2006, he placed several calls to public officials, including Stevens, in a sting effort. The content of those calls has not been disclosed.
The 1999 vehicle exchange cited in the indictment concerned a new car for Stevens' "dependent child," not naming the person. At the time, his only dependent child was daughter Lily.
Allen transferred a new 1999 Land Rover Discovery, which he had bought for $44,000, to Stevens. In exchange, Stevens gave Allen, a car collector with a love of Fords, a 1964 Mustang and $5,000. But the Mustang was worth less than $20,000, according to the indictment.
Lily Stevens, now 27, is the sole child of Stevens' marriage to his second wife, Catherine. Lily, a law clerk in Washington, is engaged to be married in late August. A call to her Washington office was not returned.
Stevens' first wife, Ann, was killed in the crash of a private jet in Anchorage in 1978 that injured Stevens. Ted and Ann Stevens had five children together, including Ben.
ALASKAN OF THE CENTURY
Stevens, 84, is the longest-serving Republican in the U.S. Senate. From 2003 to 2007, he was Senate president pro tem and third in line to the presidency. With political power that increased with his longevity, Stevens came to represent Alaska's clout in Congress. In January 2000, Stevens was named "Alaskan of the Century," and the Anchorage airport was renamed in his honor that July.
That was also the year of the bulk of the Girdwood home renovations.
Alaska's other senator, Lisa Murkowski, expressed shock at the indictment in a prepared statement today.
"I know Ted Stevens to be an honorable, hard-working Alaskan who has served our state well for as long as we have been a state," she said. "As to the charges, we are at the beginning of the criminal process and there is a judicial procedure in place that will be followed."
Murkowski, a Republican, probably owes her election in 2004 to Stevens. She was trailing former Gov. Tony Knowles in the polls until the final weeks, when Stevens began blitzing the state with commercials saying he needed her beside him in Washington.
Sen. Daniel Inouye, D-Hawaii, Stevens' best friend in the Senate, said in a brief statement: "In our legal system, a man is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. ... As far as I am concerned, Ted Stevens remains my friend. I believe in him."
Stevens and Inouye are both World War II veterans and call each other "brother." When Stevens became chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee in 2005, he named Inouye vice chairman rather than the usual term "ranking member" afforded the senior member of the opposite party.
Inouye returned the favor last year when Democrats took over the Senate and he became chairman.
http://www.adn.com/news/alaska/story/478349.html
~ ~ ~
NEW DISCOVERY (08-06-08): Undisclosed conflicts of interest with Gregory Dunn; Hawaii Nature Center; Hawaii Dental Service; Faye Kurren; Judge Barry Kurren; Dee Jay Mailer; Kamehameha Schools; Don Carroll, etc:
From the Hawaii Nature Center website:
Gregory D. Dunn was appointed executive director of the Hawaii Nature Center March 1, 2002. Dunn joins the Hawaii Nature Center after more than three years as executive director of the Atherton Branch of the YMCA of Honolulu. He brings to the Nature Center a strong track record in facility management, fund development, recruitment and project management. Previously he was operations manager for two new retail projects in Hawaii, the Barnes and Noble Superstores of Honolulu and NikeTown Honolulu. He is a member of the boards of Hawaii Dental Service, Inc., the Waikiki Community Center and Youth for Environmental Service. He is a trustee and chairman of the HDS Foundation. "Dunn's experience in the local community and his activities on behalf of youth in a non-profit arena made him a logical choice to lead the Hawaii Nature Center as it embarks on a plan to expand service," said Nature Center Board President, Don Carroll, also chairman of the board of Time-Warner Cable of Hawaii.
See also: Googling for Vultures in The Hawaii Nature Center
~ ~ ~
NEW DISCOVERY (07-29-08): Undisclosed financial relationships between Senator Ted Stevens, Judge Barry Kurren, Faye Kurren, Tesoro, Halliburton, VECO Pacific, others...
March 22, 2000
KELLOGG BROWN & ROOT'S ROSE™ AND FCC TECHNOLOGIES SELECTED BY TESORO NORTHWEST FOR ANACORTES REFINERY UPGRADE
DALLAS, Texas - Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), a business unit of Halliburton Company (NYSE: HAL), was recently selected to provide its state-of-the-art Residuum Oil Supercritical Extraction (ROSE™) and Fluid Catalytic Cracking (FCC) Technologies for a major upgrade at Tesoro Northwest Company's refinery in Anacortes, Washington. Tesoro Northwest Company is a subsidiary of Tesoro Petroleum Corporation. Part of an $80 million project, the upgrade will improve the ability of the refinery to run heavier, less expensive crudes while maintaining an almost equal production profile.
KBR's involvement in the multi-million dollar project includes a variety of undertakings. The company will add a grassroots 21,000 barrel-per-day ROSE unit to the refinery while incorporating KBR's advanced FCC technologies to the existing 42,000 barrel-per-day FCC. In addition to providing ROSE and FCC technology licenses, KBR also will perform basic engineering services, will supply associated proprietary equipment and will be responsible for a portion of the detailed engineering, procurement and construction activities in conjunction with engineering contractors Anvil Corporation and VECO Pacific, Inc.
"This win has provided Kellogg Brown & Root with several great opportunities - the ability to work with a growing refining and marketing company like Tesoro, to link our world class FCC and ROSE technologies, and to expand our current presence in the northwest," said Kellogg Brown & Root President Jack Stanley....
Headquartered in Houston, Kellogg Brown & Root is an international, technology-based engineering and construction company providing a full spectrum of industry-leading services to the hydrocarbon, chemical, energy, forest products, manufacturing, and mining and minerals industries.
Founded in 1919, Halliburton Company is the world's leading diversified energy services, engineering, energy equipment, construction and maintenance company. In 1999, Halliburton's consolidated revenues were $14.9 billion and it conducted business with a workforce of approximately 100,000 in more than 120 countries. The company's World Wide Web site can be accessed at http://www.halliburton.com .
Tesoro Petroleum Corporation is an independent refiner and marketer of petroleum products and provider of marine logistics services. Tesoro operates three refineries in the western U.S. with a combined capacity of 275,000 barrels per day. Tesoro's branded retail network is currently comprised of approximately 240 stations, of which 61 are company owned and operated.
Contact
Wendy Hagan
Halliburton Company
Public Relations
wendy.hagan@halliburton.com
http://www.halliburton.com/news/archive/2000/kbrnws_032200.jsp
See also:
www.kycbs.net/CV05-00030-Witness-Stevens-Ted.htm
www.kycbs.net/CV05-00030-Witness-Kurren-Barry.htm
www.kycbs.net/CV05-00030-Witness-Inouye-Dan.htm
~ ~ ~
NEW DISCOVERY (06-20-08):
June 20, 2008
New offshore drilling not a quick fix, analysts say
Start-up delays, global market pressures cited
By Lisa Wangsness, Boston Globe Staff
President Bush and Republican presidential candidate John McCain have called this week for lifting a federal moratorium on offshore oil exploration, arguing that taking action to increase domestic oil supplies will help drive down prices.
But analysts say that renewed offshore drilling would have little impact on gas prices anytime soon.
It would take at least a decade for oil companies to obtain permits, procure equipment, and do the exploration necessary to get the oil out of the ground, most industry analysts say. And even then, they add, the amount of new oil produced would probably be too small to significantly affect world oil prices.
Some analysts point out that the wells the United States now depends on are being depleted, and that new exploration could at least help offset that decline in supply from existing wells.
Expanded offshore exploration also carries with it some environmental risks, from oil spills to destruction of habitat to vibrations that damage sea life, which environmentalists say could have catastrophic consequences that far outweigh any potential benefit from further offshore drilling. But other analysts say that improved technology means the risks are much smaller than a generation ago. In this view, a sensible compromise approach would be to make decisions on potential drilling sites on a case-by-case basis.
Americans' anger over $4-a-gallon gasoline apparently has prompted greater public support for renewed offshore drilling. A Gallup poll last month found that 57 percent of respondents favored such drilling while 41 percent were opposed. Democratic candidate Barack Obama supports the moratorium.
The debate over expanded oil exploration has always been polarizing - recall the ferocity of the fight over whether to drill in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge - but some analysts are calling for a more moderate tone.
“Clearly, drilling is not the solution to our oil dependence, but any serious energy proposal has to be comprehensive and include more oil supply and production off the outer continental shelf," said Robbie Diamond, president and founder of Securing America's Future Energy, a nonpartisan group committed to reducing the nation's dependence on oil.
In the short term, oil prices could go down slightly if Congress lifts its moratorium on new offshore drilling, which has been in place since 1981, because the market would factor in the prospect of additional oil supplies later on. But the actual oil would not be produced for 10 to 12 years.
And in any case, increased American production from offshore drilling would not necessarily mean lower prices for American consumers because oil is a global commodity whose price is set by global supply and demand.
"Suppose the US produced all its oil domestically," said Robert Kaufmann, director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Studies at Boston University. "Do you think oil companies would sell oil to US consumers for one cent less than they could get from French consumers? No. Where oil comes from has no effect on price."
And there is not likely to be enough new American oil to make much of a difference, Kaufmann and others said. About 86 billion barrels of additional oil may lie offshore, according to the US government's Energy Information Administration. Of that amount, about 18 billion barrels are subject to the moratorium. Much of the rest lies in areas that are too expensive to exploit or that oil companies have not yet tapped for technical reasons, fueling the industry's desire for fresh territory.
"We're picking over bones," said Cathy Landry, a spokeswoman for the American Petroleum Institute. "If we had new acres, we could hypothetically make a big find. We need oil and natural gas in the future."
But in the best-case scenario, Kaufmann said, the United States could only produce an additional two to four million barrels of offshore oil a day - not enough to shift the global supply-demand balance in a world market that now consumes about 86 million barrels a day and is growing fast. About a quarter of that consumption now occurs in the United States.
Kaufmann said that by the time any additional offshore oil got to market, much of it would merely offset losses from the depletion of current oil fields. Meanwhile, oil producing nations can easily keep supply constant by limiting capacity if they know the United States is adding more.
"There's nothing on the supply side that we can really do to disrupt OPEC's ability to influence prices," he said.
Environmentalists argue that the pollution caused by drilling could compromise fragile ecosystems for very little economic benefit when the United States should be focusing on conservation - the cheapest barrel of oil, they like to say, is the one we don't have to buy - and developing better renewable energy sources.
They point to a number of environmental risks. Drilling fluids contain toxic chemicals. If oil is found, one of the waste products is briny water that also contains toxic chemicals. The noise from drilling could harm some sea animals, such as whales. And the oil would also have to be transported by pipeline or ship, creating its own environmental impacts. Then there is a risk of spills.
"Today we think offshore oil drilling could be the final straw in the unfolding collapse of New England fisheries," said Priscilla Brooks, director of the Ocean Conservation Project at the Conservation Law Foundation, which successfully fought a proposed drilling lease on Georges Bank in the late 1970s.
But Nancy Rabalais, executive director of the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium and a scientist who has studied the effects of offshore oil production in the Gulf of Mexico, said that she believes expanding offshore oil exploration would not pose terrible risks to the environment because the effects are relatively contained, and the industry is well-regulated.
Henry Lee, who teaches energy policy at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government, said he believes there is a middle ground. There is no panacea, he said, for solving America's energy problems, so it may be best to lift the prohibitions on offshore drilling, and carefully consider the oil potential and possible environmental costs in different locations on a case-by-case basis.
"Each side, I think, is not being reasonable about this," he said. "I want to do the analysis and figure out what the implications are."
New offshore drilling not a quick fix, analysts say
For more, see: www.kycbs.net/Oil-Stupid.htm
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< < < FLASHBACK < < <
March 31, 2002
Simon has millions in oil stocks as California fights offshore drilling
DON THOMPSON, Associated Press
SACRAMENTO ---- As California battles the Bush administration over plans to drill for oil off the state's coast, Republican candidate for governor Bill Simon has millions of dollars invested in companies that would benefit if drilling is allowed.
If drilling starts, the companies in which Simon owns stock could gain drilling contracts, ship the oil pumped from beneath the sea and then sell that oil. As governor, Simon could end California's legal efforts to stop drilling.
A Los Angeles millionaire and former oil company vice president, Simon has said repeatedly he opposes additional drilling off California's coast, but has defended his vast investments.
"Just because you're against offshore drilling in certain areas doesn't mean you're against offshore drilling worldwide," Simon said in January.
But his extensive ties to offshore oil interests don't comfort drilling opponents.
"To have someone heavily invested in the oil industry overseeing California's coast is a little scary," said Carl Zichella, the Sierra Club's regional director. "If he waffles (on offshore drilling) at all, it will be to his political detriment."
The Bush administration wants a federal appeals court to allow drilling off San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara and Ventura counties. Democratic Gov. Gray Davis used the courts to block attempts to build the first new oil platforms off California's coast since 1994, rejected settlement offers and has sworn he will take the case to the U.S. Supreme Court if necessary.
Simon has at least tens of thousands of dollars invested in companies with direct interests in the dispute, financial disclosure documents show, and owns millions more in companies that drill, sell and ship oil by tankers and pipelines.
For example, he owns up to $100,000 of SeaRiver Maritime Financial Holdings Inc., a subsidiary of Exxon Mobil Corp., which is one of the companies holding the 36 leases at issue in the federal drilling case. It also owns currently producing leases. A SeaRiver subsidiary, formerly Exxon Shipping Co., operated the Exxon Valdez that ran aground and spilled oil off Alaska in 1989.
Through family trusts, Simon owns up to $100,000 of stock in USX-Marathon, an Exxon Mobil partner, and Occidental Petroleum, a Shell partner. The trusts own between $4,000 and $20,000 worth of stock in Royal Dutch Petroleum/Shell Oil Co. and ChevronTexaco; both hold California offshore leases.
While Simon owns some oil stock, campaign strategist Jeff Flint said, Davis has accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign contributions from companies including ChevronTexaco and Occidental, including $176,000 last year alone.
Simon also owns hundreds of thousands of dollars of stock in Seacor Smit Inc., a Houston-based drilling and shipping company, and its former subsidiary, Chiles Offshore Inc., which specializes in offshore drilling.
U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission documents indicate that one-third of Chiles Offshore's business comes from Shell. Seacor Smit, meanwhile, established what its chairman called a "toehold" on the California coast last year when it bought a West Coast supply vessel.
SEC documents and the Simon campaign indicate that South Street Capital LLC, an investment firm controlled by the Simon family, sold about $4 million in Chiles stock last year. Simon declared no income from the stock sale in the financial disclosure report he filed with the Fair Political Practices Commission, but reported owning a maximum of $1 million invested by South Street in the company.
Campaign finance reports and Simon's disclosure forms show some offshore oil money may have gone to his campaign. He sold hundreds of thousands worth of energy stocks last year as he poured more than $4 million of his own money into his campaign. Meanwhile, Simon's siblings, who share in family trust profits, have given him at least $750,000.
Last year, Simon sold as much as $100,000 worth of stock in Diamond Offshore Drilling of Houston, which engaged in three drilling projects off California's coast in the 1980s....
His father, William E. Simon, was President Nixon's "energy czar" through the Arab oil embargo of the early 1970s before becoming treasury secretary. In 1988, Simon and his brother joined their father in William E. Simon & Sons, an investment firm with substantial holdings in the energy industry.
Corporate records from Florida, Louisiana and Mississippi show Simon was a vice president and director through the mid-1990s in Paramount Oil Co. of Baton Rouge, La., and Shore Oil Co. of Houston, oil and exploration companies that had extensive holdings in the Gulf of Mexico region.
Paramount merged into Shore, which later merged with a firm that eventually became 3TEC Energy. Simon sold up to $100,000 in 3TEC shares last year; family trusts own as much as $1 million in 3TEC stock.
Those companies drilled off the Gulf of Mexico coast, Flint said, so it's not "fair to tie Bill's investments" to California.
Oil, gas and other energy company executives have also donated thousands to Simon's campaign, state campaign finance records show.
They include $5,000 from Tesoro Petroleum, a Texas-based company active in offshore drilling, and $22,000 from people and firms connected to Alvin V. Shoemaker, former chairman of First Boston Corp. and a director of Shore Oil and Paramount. Occidental contributed $10,000.
Davis this month accused Simon of profiting from California's energy crisis through business dealings with El Paso Natural Gas, which regulators alleged helped drive up gas and electricity prices last summer.
A Simon family investment company owns between $10,000 and $100,000 in El Paso stock. Simon also sold as much as $100,000 worth of stock last year in 3TEC Energy Corp., 20 percent of which is owned by an investment arm of El Paso.
Simon is a major investor and former board member of Houston-based Hanover Compressor Co., which does business with companies such as El Paso and the bankrupt energy giant Enron.
Davis himself is defending his acceptance since 1996 of $119,500 in campaign funds from Enron.
Simon's charitable foundation also benefits from extensive oil and gas investments, primarily Hanover Compressor.
While Simon was a board member, Hampton joined Enron in a Venezuela-based partnership, SEC records show, before Enron's collapse. After Simon left the board, Hanover ran into Enron-style accounting problems this year over its involvement in the Hampton Roads gas project off the coast of Nigeria with California leaseholder Shell Oil Co.
Though the California Coastal Commission and the state attorney general also are parties to California's suit against the Bush administration, Simon if he became governor could use his legal and budgetary power to end the state's efforts.
"He could make it not just difficult ---- impossible" to continue, said Nathan Barankin, spokesman for Democratic Attorney General Bill Lockyer.
Eleven environmental groups have joined the state's suit, arguing that most Californians want to defend their world-famous coastline.
Simon agrees "there should not be any new exploration or drilling off the coast of California," Flint said. However, he said Simon has taken no position on what he would do with existing contracts such as are at stake in the California suit.
"He would have to take a look at it," Flint said.
For more, see: www.kycbs.net/SimonSays.htm
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NEW DISCOVERY (05-30-08):
January 17, 2002
State settles oil
suit for 1%
The $2 billion action over
inflated gas prices finally
sputters out for a penny
on the dollar
By Tim Ruel, Star-Bulletin
The state has agreed to end its three-year price-fixing lawsuit against Hawaii's major oil companies in return for a $20 million settlement from the five firms still fighting the case, a payment that would be 1 percent of the roughly $2 billion the state had been seeking.
A deal in principle was reached between all sides yesterday after six months of mediation, said attorney Clyde Matsui, who served as mediator and discovery master in the suit. The companies and the state must still negotiate specific points of the settlement, he said. Matsui would not comment on the specific amount of the settlement.
The settlement is about $20 million, according to a person familiar with the deal who requested anonymity. The amount could change in the final agreement.
The money comes on top of $15 million the state won in a settlement in 2000 with two companies, BHP Hawaii Inc. and Tesoro Petroleum Corp., which opted out of the suit and denied wrongdoing. Still contesting the case were Hawaii's market leader, Chevron Corp., as well as Tosco Corp., Texaco Inc., Shell Oil Co. and Unocal Corp.
"If it's $20 million, we all lost," said Frank Young, a former Chevron dealer and frequent critic of the company. Chevron sued in 1999 to evict Young from the Kakaako station operated by his company since 1953, and under a confidential settlement, Young abandoned the station on Tuesday. "I'm all depressed now," Young said.
He added that he hoped the state Legislature would react to the deal by discussing regulations for Hawaii's gas prices, which have long been among the highest in the nation.
"It is a settlement that I am a little disappointed in," Gov. Ben Cayetano said yesterday morning to reporters. "But it depends on the perspective of the judges." Local oil prices have gone down since the state filed the suit, Cayetano noted.
The state sued the companies in October 1998, alleging the firms secretly formed a conspiracy to milk profits from Hawaii's drivers by keeping prices artificially high. The firms denied the charges and said that the lawsuit, filed shortly before the 1998 gubernatorial election, was political.
The settlement comes at a significant point in the case, as senior U.S. District Judge Samuel King considers motions for summary judgment argued by the oil companies in hearings in November. In summary judgment a defendant seeks to dismiss entire counts, or even a whole case, on the basis that there is not enough evidence to warrant a trial. In rebuttal the state said it had plenty of evidence, including documents that showed officials at competing companies were sharing their local wholesale prices.
The state also said it had proof that Chevron, operator of one of two oil refineries in Hawaii, would sell gasoline to the other companies with the understanding that the firms would not seek better prices elsewhere, such as by importing.
Shortly before the November hearings, King ordered that the oil companies come up with a plan to open the summary motion documents to the public. The documents, like the bulk of filings in the case, have been under seal. The oil companies have argued that the information should be secret because many of the documents contain competitive financial information. In his order, however, King noted that much of the case rests on the extent of the profits the companies have earned from the Hawaii market.
All the documents in the case would eventually become available to the public, but the oil companies would have the opportunity to blot out specific pieces of information. It is not clear how much the companies would be able to redact.
It will be interesting to see how much information about the profitability of the companies becomes public, because the data could enrage people or mean nothing at all, said Tim Hamilton, a mainland petroleum analyst who has studied Hawaii's market. The whole point of an antitrust lawsuit should be to uncover a trail of collusion, Hamilton said.
"If these documents go public, the Legislature will have a trail to follow. The public will be upset even more than it is now, and there's a chance the Legislature will take an action," Hamilton said.
In March 1998, months before the state filed suit, the Star-Bulletin published a story with an analysis by Hamilton that said Hawaii consumers were overcharged more than $81 million for gasoline in the previous 14 months because of artificially high wholesale prices. At the time, Chevron and other companies said the analysis was simplistic and flawed.
In recent court filings, the state said that any potential damages from the suit would likely go to the state highway fund, not directly to consumers. The fund generally pays for road maintenance, but some money has been transferred to the state's general fund, according to records kept by the state Transportation Department.
The latest negotiations between the state and the companies began on Monday, a convenient time, since lawyers from all sides were in town for hearings on separate matters that had been scheduled this week, Matsui said. "This is the most intense 36 hours I've ever been through," said Matsui, who has handled mediation in lawsuits involving the former Bishop Estate and the Board of Water Supply. "We started off Monday with everyone hollering 'no.'"
The court ordered the state and the companies not to talk about details of the settlement until an agreement has been finalized, and representatives of both sides declined comment today. The settlement should be filed with the court soon for public review, and a hearing would be scheduled for King to sign off.
Because the state sued on behalf of Hawaii's residents, people will have the right to say they want to be excluded from the terms of the settlement, Matsui said. He noted that members of the public have rarely exercised that right.
The gasoline antitrust lawsuit
Key developments in the state's antitrust lawsuit:
>> March 1998: Gov. Ben Cayetano directs the state attorney general to determine whether an investigation of Hawaii's highest-in-the-nation gas prices is warranted.
>> Oct. 2, 1998: State files $500 million suit against Hawaii's two refineries and major gasoline wholesalers for allegedly overcharging local consumers for years. Named in the lawsuit are 13 corporations, including Chevron Corp., BHP Hawaii Inc., Shell Oil Co., Texaco Inc., Tesoro Petroleum Corp., Tosco Corp. and Unocal