Opinion ID: 3058598
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Oscar Valle

Text: Delvin Ortega16 was employed by Oscar Valle. Ortega explained to the jury his experience in Valle’s scheme. Oscar Valle created various shell companies, including Trebol Construction (“Trebol”), Huber Construction (“Huber”), Mira Construction (“Mira”), DJ, and SNF Construction (“SNF”), for the purpose of obtaining workers’ compensation insurance policies and permitting other companies to perform work under the insurance policies for Valle’s companies. 16 Ortega is also known as Tomas Garcia 28 Contractor employers wrote checks to Valle’s companies to pay their workers, and these checks were cashed at La Bamba for a fee. Like the other shell companies, Valle’s companies did not perform any construction work and Valle’s friends and relatives functioned as their corporate officers.17 As with the other shell companies, the addresses listed in state records for Valle created companies were residential addresses that gave no indication that construction business was transacted there. Valle’s commissions were placed in an envelope for him at La Bamba. It was Ortega’s responsibility to pick up the commissions for Huber and Mira. From November 2006 until March 2007, Ortega waited at La Bamba, usually on Fridays and sometimes on Saturdays, to pick up the envelopes containing Valle’s 4% commissions. These commissions ranged from $13,000 to $16,000 weekly, but Ortega recalled the largest was $23,000. Ortega received these commissions from either a female employee, Caro or Gonzalez. La Bamba filed CTRs for transactions totaling $60,949,702 for Valle’s five shell companies. From March until November 2007, La Bamba filed 157 CTRs for DJ transactions totaling $14.5 million. From September 2006 until November 17 The corporate representative for Trebol was Oscar Valle’s father; the corporate representative for Huber was Valle’s mother Flora; the corporate representative for Mira was Miguel Ramirez, Valle’s friend; the corporate representative for DJ was Valle’s aunt Gladys; and the corporate representative for SNF was Francisco Ortega, another of Valle’s friends. 29 2007, La Bamba filed 243 CTRs for Huber transactions totaling $16 million. From May 2006 to November 2007, La Bamba filed 211 CTRs for Mira transactions totaling $18.9 million. From October to November 2007, La Bamba filed 13 CTRs for SNF transactions totaling $557,000. From August 2005 until November 2007, La Bamba filed 193 CTRs for Trebol transactions totaling $10.7 million. In July 2007, Obispo confided to Caro that Spirit would be dissolving because its insurance was expiring and it had no useful life without insurance. Obispo asked Caro for a company where he could place some clients. Caro gave Obispo a DJ business card, and told him to contact “Oscar” or “Tomas.” In response to Obispo’s telephone call to DJ, Valle and Ortega met Obispo at Cashflow. Valle explained he had spoken with Caro, and that he had three companies with workers’ compensation insurance to offer Obispo. Obispo was told he could write approximately $100,000 in checks to DJ weekly for a 3% commission. The checks would be cashed at La Bamba, and Valle and La Bamba would be responsible for preparing and filing the CTRs. They, further, agreed that the CTRs would falsely list DJ’s corporate officer, Gladys Valle, as receiving the cash from the check, instead of the person who actually received it. Valle assured Obispo that he had been working with Caro for four years and had never encountered a problem. Valle gave Obispo the necessary paperwork for DJ, including a copy of the 30 articles of incorporation, a copy of Gladys Valle’s driver’s license and social security number, and a certificate of workers’ compensation insurance. It was agreed that DJ’s corporate officer would not be present when the checks were cashed and that her signature would be forged. Obispo delivered checks to La Bamba made payable to DJ Construction. Caro deducted a 5% commission for Obispo’s checks written to DJ; 3% for Valle and 2% for La Bamba. From August until October 2007, Obispo brought checks to La Bamba made payable to DJ from undercover IRS companies. Notably, in these transactions the checks were left unendorsed. On one occasion, Caro asked Obispo to make the amounts of the checks smaller. On another occasion, Caro reminded Obispo to write his name on the back of the checks and to mark the checks with the initials “M.H.” as was their custom.