A Mission businessman has been charged with tampering with a witness as federal investigators delve deep into a prolific public corruption scandal that has ensnared numerous elected officials in several western Hidalgo County cities.
Jorge O’Caña Jr. — nephew to outgoing Mission Mayor Armando O’Caña, and brother to Hidalgo County Court-at-Law Judge Patricia “Patty” O’Caña-Olivarez — was arrested by FBI agents at his Mission home Tuesday morning.
According to a grand jury indictment that was unsealed after his arrest, O’Caña Jr. is charged with, “the intent to influence, delay, and prevent the testimony of Antonio Gonzalez, III, in an… official proceeding regarding a bribery scheme involving contracts awarded to Performance Services, Inc.”
O’Caña Jr.’s arrest is just one in a long list of western county residents and public officials who have been arrested over the last few months for their involvement in myriad and distinct fraud, bribery and contract schemes.
A number of those people have been charged in relation to the scheme in which O’Caña Jr. is accused of tampering with a witness — namely, a fraudulent energy savings scheme involving a company called Performance Services Inc.
Last week, a local engineer, Mariano Garcia, was charged for his connection to the scheme as it related to the Agua Special Utility District.
According to court records, Garcia, and his company, M Garcia Engineering, were hired by Agua SUD to serve as an intermediary between the public utility and Performance Services.
Agua SUD invested about $12 million into Performance Services’ promises that the utility could save money through upgrades to its customers’ water meters and other infrastructure.
But in reality, federal prosecutors say Garcia was just one cog in a larger scheme and allegedly used his pay from Agua SUD to target several other governmental entities.
Garcia allegedly used that money to pay bribes and kickbacks in an attempt to defraud entities such as the city of Mission and the La Joya Independent School District.
Armando O’Caña, the Mission mayor, declined to comment on the arrest of his nephew when reached by The Monitor Tuesday.
However, in an interview Tuesday evening, Norie Gonzalez Garza, who on Saturday defeated Armando O’Caña in his reelection bid for Mission mayor, said the spate of recent public corruption arrests are “disappointing.”
“But we’ve just gotta take it one case at a time and let the legal process go through,” Gonzalez Garza said.
“Hopefully this will send out a message to other people and hopefully we can get this cleaned up,” she further said.
The incoming mayor said she plans on fulfilling one of her campaign promises as soon as she is sworn into office — to implement a code of ethics for all city officials, similar to what Edinburg Mayor Ramiro Garza Jr. did after defeating Richard Molina in December.
Molina left the office of Edinburg mayor under a cloud of criminal charges pending a trial. State officials say the former mayor committed election fraud in the lead up to his November 2017 election victory.
“We don’t require any training for city officials so I want to implement that as soon as possible,” Gonzalez Garza said of the code of ethics.
Meanwhile, Jorge O’Caña Jr. is slated to make his initial appearance in McAllen federal court on Wednesday morning.
He faces up to 20 years in federal prison and up to a $250,000 fine if convicted on the charge, court records show.
