Remember toward the waning days of the 2008 race for Cameron County District Attorney between Armanado Villalobos and Peter Zavaletta?
If you'll remember, former DA De Leon was charged with 10 counts of tampering with governmental records and two counts of aggravated perjury in July of 2008 for her role in the release of confidential
information regarding alleged child abuse defendants.
She is charged with passing on the protected records to challenger Zavaletta which were later used in an political advertisement in the Freedom Newspapers' Brownsville Herald and the Valley Morning Star.
As a result, four of the persons named in the advertisement – Juan Antonio Coronado, Francisco Solis Ramirez, Roberto Rivera II, and Ruben Contreras – sued De Leon, Zavaletta, the Brownsville Herald and the Valley Morning Star.
At the time that the records were released de Leon was on the board of directors of Monica’s House, a child abuse advocacy organization.
On April 9, 2010, de Leon entered into an agreement to avoid prosecution and the substantial risk of a
conviction at trial before 404th Judicial District Court Judge Elia Cornejo.
After a series of legal twists and turns which included charges that then-District 404th Judge Abel Limas had issued favorable rulings to the plaintiffs in exchange for cash, the case continued through the legal process. Now we get word that late last month de Leon, through Monica's House insurance, had reached a settlement in the case with the four defendants.
Coronado was represented by attorney Paul Fourt, Brownsville, and Rivera by Attorney Bobby Lerma, also of Brownsville.
All the plaintiffs – including the remaining two, Ramirez and Contreras – were also represented by Marc Rosenthal. Assigned Judge Robert M. Blackmon granted a motion by Rosenthal to withdraw from the case and named his partner J. Lynn Watson as his substitute. Rosenthal was convicted in federal court in Corpus Christi on racketeering and bribery charges
Blockman has scheduled a hearing on Zavaletta and Freedom Newspaper's motion for a summary judgment in the case for April 26, 2013.
Confidentiality clauses in the settlement agreement prevent the disclosure of the amounts that either Monica's House or de Leon's insurance paid to settle with the four men. However, we understand that it totaled in the $100,000s.
Incidentally, the Cameron County Commissioners Court appointed de Leon as one of seven directors to oversee the brand new Cameron County Spaceport Development Corporation, whose goal is to help establish a commercial launch facility on the Texas Gulf Coast for use by SpaceX and to attract other space companies to the area.
Their terms start once they're sworn in April 8.
Their terms start once they're sworn in April 8.
Pct. 3 Commissioner David Garza appointed de Leon to that board, at the time saying that "these were the right candidates and a unanimous vote demonstrates that. It was the next step of what needed to be done as far as the county was concerned to continue moving forward with the project."
Ready to shoulder a little more liability, commissioner?
Ready to shoulder a little more liability, commissioner?
4 comments:
She is the one that cost us to pay take her of the board
Yolanda de Leon is a fine person and was a very good DA. Unfortunately for her, she got sideways with Cameron County politics and was made a scapegoat. Too bad. She is a fine lady.
Commissioner Garza and De Leon have been very close for years. No surprise he appointed her, she has always helper in his campaigns, but no one refers to her as a POLITICARA because of her affluence and money, but she is no different than the other vote robbers.
Yolanda De Leon was nothing more than an alleged bought paid official for the Establishment of Harlingen. The bitch got into bed with Zavaletta because Armando Villalobos beat her and got elected as DA. Unfortunately, that fucking greedy dumbass AV took money and got caught and thus Indicted! Well, at least he put that power hungry mongrel bitch of de leon in her place for a while. She might have walked on the criminal charges but she had to fork out a lot of money to try and defend the allegations. Now, the bitch settled out of court? Good! Payback is a bitch isn't you power hungry mongrel bitch!
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