A MORAL INDICTMENT OF RICK ZAYAS AND RAY MARCHAN

By Juan Montoya
Last December, the family of Arturo Hernandez was dealt a severe blow.
The 40-year-old shrimp boat captain was forced to go out into the Gulf of Mexico with a three-man crew to make a living after failing to find employment on land. He told a friend that he didn't like leaving his family alone when he went out to sea. But, without work, there was nothing else he could do.
A day later, the Coast Guard received a mayday call around 3 a.m. The crew of the Mario Arturo II reported the boat was sinking about 10 miles south of the Galveston jetties. Hernandez and three other crew members ended up in the water.
That was the last that was seen of Hernandez. The three other crewmen were rescued. A month later, his body was found washed up on a beach around Galveston.
But if his widow and his children thought the nightmare was over after his burial, they had another thing coming. Two men – identified as two local attorneys – showed up at her door trying to persuade her to sign some release papers and relinquish further claims for a small amount of cash.
She refused and called an acquaintance who told her to contact her attorney and ask him what to do.
"She later found out that it was Rick Zayas and Ray Marchan who were trying to get her to sign away her rights," said a friend who she called to ask for advice. "First the fish got her husband, and then she has the sharks circling the water."
Widows seem to be a recurring target for Zayas. A few years ago, after the death of millionaire rancher Raul Tijerina, he represented one of the Cardenas sons in his claims against his estate after he befriended him in his dying days. Among some of the items Cardenas was claiming was a private plane he claimed Tijerina had promised him as a gift. His widow, Hortencia, fought the claims in court and eventually prevailed.
And as the ongoing judiciary corruption case involving Abel Limas drags on through the federal courts, the names of these two attorneys keep turning up. Marchan, a graduate from the prestigious Stanford Law School, was indicted recently after Limas told federal prosecutors that he had received $4,000 in exchange for an ad litem appointment in the case involving an investment by local physician Juan Mancillas.
Zayas, a graduate of Texas Southern University, first referred the Mancillas case that ended up in a huge $9 million settlement with an investment company that operated what the IRS determined was a tax dodge, to McAllen lawyers Albert Garcia and Adrian Martinez.
The Limas plea packet memo shows that an attorney identified as Person D paid $4,500 dollars to get appointed as an ad litem attorney in a December 2005 lawsuit, which ended in a $9 million dollar settlement.
That case involved his appointment as an ad litem attorney appointed by Limas to oversee an estate or act as a guardian for a child or an incapacitated adult. The plea agreement show that Person D got a $12,000 dollar check in October 2008 and paid Limas $4,500 dollars.
News media have reported that although court records show that 15 attorneys were involved in the case, Marchan was appointed by Limas as an ad litem in the case back in January 2008.
On September 11, 2008, the firm of Garcia and Martinez issued a press release of a jury award $9 million in damages to their clients Dr. Juan and Sylvia Mancillas in their lawsuit against the National Heritage Foundation (“NHF”).
After the settlement and news emerged that Limas had taken money in return for making decisions in favor of selected attorneys, that case also appears to be headed back to court. Another multi-million settlement involving a helicopter crash in the Laguna Madre where Limas made rulings in return for large cash payments is also being appealed.
The families of the victims have sued to have lead attorney Mark Rosenthal of Austin forfeit his multi-million attorney's fee to the families of the victims.
In that case, former state representative Jim Solis pleaded guilty to bribing Limas in return for favorable rulings from the disgraced district judge.
The Zayas-Garcia relationship has evolved over time and Garcia was the attorney for Zayas in the defamation case he and Ruben Cortez filed against Accion America activist Carlos Quintanilla. The case was settled after the litigants agreed to nos-suit each other a few months ago in Brownsville.
Not all the shoes have dropped in that federal investigation. Rosenthal, a principal in the case, is yet to be indicted or arrested, although all the clues point in his direction.
"The feds must be trying to squeeze the other defendants to make sure they got an airtight case against the remaining suspects," said a local bondsman. "Those boys usually don't move until they got a solid indictment."
Meanwhile, as the negotiations continue with the firm of a former FBI Agent who will perform a forensic audit on the finances of the Brownsville Independent School District over the past three years, Zayas and his cohorts who were on the majority of the board must feel the footsteps as the books are open to investigators and the actions of the former board members come under scrutiny.
"Some people in town who were there when the district went through the reserves and depleted them from about $148 million to less than $65 million are probably not sleeping very well," said a BISD board majority supporter. "The majority has made it clear that the investigators will have a free hand and will be free to interview everyone from board members to the lowest employee."