McALLEN — Former La Joya mayor Jose “Fito” Salinas, his daughter, Frances Salinas De Leon, and a third person have been sentenced to federal prison for their roles in defrauding the city, the La Joya Economic Development Corporation, and the La Joya Housing Authority out of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
The trio learned their fate during a lengthy sentencing hearing at the McAllen federal courthouse Thursday during which U.S. District Judge Randy Crane repeatedly noted an endemic atmosphere of corruption within La Joya.
“There is this culture of corruption there in La Joya,” Crane said near the end of the three-hour hearing.
CORRUPT CULTURE
It was that prolific public corruption that prompted the judge to hand down sentences stiffer than those recommended under the federal sentencing guidelines.
Crane sentenced the former mayor to the maximum amount of time recommended — 33 months in federal prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release. The judge added that Salinas’ age was the sole mitigating factor that had saved him from a longer sentence.
“I considered upward departing because I think corruption like this” erodes the public trust, Crane said, referring to the prerogative judges have to “depart” from recommendations by sentencing a defendant to more or less time, depending on mitigating circumstances.
“But given your age… I’m not going to upward depart,” Crane said to the 83-year-old Salinas.
The judge was less lenient on Salinas’ daughter, whom he called the “mastermind” of the fraud schemes. Because of that, Crane delivered a six-month upward departure when handing Salinas De Leon her sentence.
Crane sentenced Salinas De Leon to 39 months in federal prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release.
“She didn’t have an honest day,” Crane said of the 54-year-old Salinas De Leon.
“Ms. De Leon is more culpable than her father in that she was the main actor in the fraud,” Crane said.
The pair was also ordered to pay financial restitution.
They pleaded guilty in order to avoid going to trial. But though they admitted responsibility for their crimes, Salinas nonetheless seemed somewhat taken aback by the details of the schemes as described in court Thursday.
“I was very surprised as to what I heard today, what I supposedly done or should have done,” the former mayor and retired educator said when given the opportunity to address the court.
“Never have I ever taken money from anybody,” he said, while acknowledging that he would “abide” by whatever sentence he received.
Later, when his daughter addressed the court, she, too, seemed to qualify her admission of guilt with some hesitancy.
“I’d like to apologize for my actions. I take full and sole responsibility in my alleged schemes,” Salinas De Leon said.
The judge later sentenced the third defendant, Ramiro Alaniz — who formerly served as the maintenance supervisor at the La Joya Housing Authority — to nine months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release.
Alaniz’s lesser sentence was due in part to his smaller role in the fraud.
“He, in the scheme of things, was the low man on the totem pole,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarina S. DiPiazza said about Alaniz.
FATHER AND DAUGHTER
It was the father-daughter duo that prosecutors and, in turn, the judge focused on during the bulk of the three-hour hearing Thursday.
Salinas and Salinas De Leon pleaded guilty last year for their roles in orchestrating the schemes to defraud the city, its EDC and the housing authority.
Salinas pleaded guilty for fraudulently using his position as mayor to help one of his daughter’s associates, a woman named Sylvia Garces Valdez, land a $22,000 public relations contract with the housing authority.
Salinas also admitted to using his position to appoint his daughter as the interim executive director of the La Joya Housing Authority, which enabled her to later defraud that organization.
Valdez, who also faced federal charges at one point, pleaded guilty to related criminal charges in state court and was sentenced to probation. The federal charges against her were ultimately dismissed.
Meanwhile, Salinas De Leon and Alaniz pleaded guilty to their roles in a larger scheme — one which bilked hundreds of thousands of dollars from the La Joya EDC.
In that scheme, Salinas De Leon took over the management of a project to improve a daycare center in La Joya known as the Arcoiris Daycare.
Salinas De Leon took on the role of administering the economic development loans issued by the EDC using funds from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which funds revolving small business loans in rural communities.
Salinas De Leon also served as a consultant to the owners of the daycare, a couple referred to in court as “the Ochoas.”
It was this scheme, in particular, which the judge seemed to focus on when handing down Salinas De Leon’s sentence.
Salinas De Leon became involved in the Archoiris project, in part, to help rectify another elected official’s corruption related to the project.
In recordings of public meetings, Crane said that Salinas De Leon could be heard clearly “incensed” that funds had been stolen by a public official.
But as soon as she became a part of the project, she began to do the same thing, the judge said.
Salinas De Leon told La Joya EDC officials that the daycare could be rehabilitated with a $75,000 loan. But within six weeks, she had returned to them seeking an additional $150,000.
In all, Salinas De Leon secured approximately $341,000 in loans on behalf of the daycare project.
But rather than use the money to build the daycare and get it operating, Salinas De Leon was actually running two separate schemes at once — the first, to gather kickbacks from the subcontractors working on the project, and the second to withdraw money directly from the daycare center’s bank account using an ATM card.
“Ms. De Leon treated the city as her own personal bank account,” DiPiazza, the prosecutor, said.
In some instances, she used ill-gotten money to fund trips to San Antonio where one of her sons was facing criminal charges of his own, prosecutors said.
“So we have three generations of Salinases that are breaking the law?” Crane asked with a note of incredulity.
To date, not one repayment has been made toward the loan balances, DiPiazza said.
Money was a factor in the sentences Crane handed down Thursday. Along with the prison terms, the judge ordered each of the three defendants pay restitution to the entities they defrauded. In Salinas De Leon’s case, the judge also issued a property forfeiture order.
Crane ordered the former mayor to pay some $320,531.26 in restitution — $162,000 of that to the city, $100,000 to the EDC and $58,531 to the housing authority.
He ordered Salinas De Leon to pay $280,531.26 in restitution — $200,000 to the EDC, $58,531.26 to the housing authority, and $22,000 to the city.
Crane also ordered a $61,500 property forfeiture.
Meanwhile, Alaniz, the housing authority supervisor who also served as the project manager for the Arcoiris Daycare project, was ordered to pay $100,000 in restitution.
Both he and Salinas have until May 31 to surrender themselves to the U.S. Marshals to begin their sentences, while Salinas De Leon must surrender herself by May 2.
Referring again to the pervasive “culture of corruption,” the judge said Salinas seemed to have lived an exemplary life prior to taking public office.
Indeed, nearly a dozen people who knew Salinas from his 35 years as an educator and administrator submitted letters of support for the former mayor.
“This seemed to change when he got involved in politics. As they say, power corrupts,” Crane said.
“Hopefully, this culture of corruption will end,” Crane later said.
Editor’s note: This story was been updated to correct the misidentification of Sylvia Garces Valdez.
