Ed Hardy, the president of Curry Company, was closely associated with Mariposa County officials, in particular, Mariposa District Attorney Bruce Eckerson, County Assessor Steve Dunbar, and Congressman Tony Coelho, whose district encompassed Mariposa and the Park. The annual camping trips that the three men took together was encouraged by the local townsfolk because most of Mariposa’s tax base emanated from Curry Company. Coelho and Hardy were regular fixtures around town, seen at most of the social events. Coelho even cooked and served spaghetti dinners for the whole town annually at the Mariposa Fair Grounds, and purchased property in partnership with one member of the Mariposa Board of Supervisors. In fact, Mariposa was one of the first places he bid farewell to after resigning from Congress to avoid an investigation of his finances.

Tony Coelho, Al Gore's Campaign Chairman and Charles Manatt go way back. The Atlantic Monthly in an October 1986 story by Gregg Easterbrook, described the dark days after the 1980 Reagan landslide when the Republicans had all the money and the Democratic Party could seemingly raise none. Two new stars arose to resurrect the party and make it financially competitive again. "The Democratic camp stood in even worse disorder than usual, with a little known Los Angeles lawyer, Charles Manatt, taking over the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and the utterly anonymous Tony Coelho, a thirty-nine year-old California congressman with no organizational experience, assuming leadership of the related Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), which is charged with raising money for democratic congressmen. Twenty-five more seats in 1982 would have given the Republicans the House, and with it, full control over federal decision making. The conventional wisdom held that the Democratic Party would not get out of the Reagan revolution alive." But get out alive it did. It was not without incurring the wrath of some of the Democratic old guard that Coelho and Manatt resurrected party finances. But, according to the article, "Coelho tripled the take from DCCC fund raising, from $2 million to $6 million, in his first two years." The story continued three paragraphs later, "Another businesslike decision Coelho made early on was to invest a portion of the DCCC's rapidly increasing income. Previously, the money had immediately gone out to finance campaigns or to retire old debts; some of these venerable obligations date to the days of the Humphrey-Nixon race. Coelho set aside about $3.5 million of the first $6 million he raised to finance a media center and a direct-mail operation; at the DNC, Charles Manatt was doing much the same." Manatt was a skilled attorney. He was also a banker. In 1965 had founded the Los Angeles law firm of Manatt and Phelps that was eventually to become one of the largest and most powerful Democratic law firms in the country. Manatt would mentor and stay close to leading California Democratic political figures like Maxine Waters, Gray Davis and Tom Bradley. Powerful behind the scenes, Manatt also became a deal maker and big time money man. Surprisingly however, Charles Manatt has also been linked to shady deals that connected to legendary drug smuggler Barry Seal and covert CIA operations of the Contra era. Recently, FTW Contributing Editor Daniel Hopsicker finished writing an as yet unpublished biography of CIA pilot/operative and legendary drug smuggler Barry Seal. While co-writing the October 1999 FTW story entitled Why Does George W Bush Fly In Drug Smuggler Barry Seal's Airplane?, Hopsicker discovered that a Beechcraft King Air 200, tail number N6308F, was directly connected to a CIA "front" company through a series of fraudulent financial transactions. That particular airplane had been leased to Barry Seal by real estate mega-developer Eugene Glick. To his surprise, while going through boxes of Seal's personal records, Hopsicker also came across documentary evidence, in Seal's own handwriting, that Glick's attorney at the time (1982) was none other than Charles Manatt. FTW has called the offices of Manatt and Phelps several times and inquired if their records confirm Manatt's representation of Glick. As of press time the firm has not responded. Could Manatt and Coelho have been solving some of the Democratic Party's financial problems with drug money? Bill Clinton was certainly doing that in Arkansas.

WASHINGTON — House Assistant Majority Leader Tony Coelho (D-Merced) on Wednesday acknowledged that he had made a $100,000 personal investment in high-yield junk bonds issued by Drexel Burnham Lambert Inc. in 1986 on the advice of a friend from Southern California but said that his tip did not come from Drexel junk-bond king Michael Milken or any other Drexel employee. Coelho, who is known to be a personal acquaintance of Milken and who has received contributions and honoraria from Drexel, said he could not explain why his investment was originally recorded by Drexel in the name of the Coelho campaign committee. He said he bought the bonds with money that he borrowed through a personal bank loan. The investment was first reported by the Washington Post, which asserted that the bonds purchased by Coelho are the type generally available only to institutional investors and regular Drexel customers. [...] In 1986, when Coelho held the bonds, he was chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. The committee received more than $100,000 from the Drexel political action committee and its employees in the period between September, 1985, and the end of 1986. The Drexel committee gave $8,000 to Coelho’s personal political action committee during 1986 and 1987, and the congressman received $4,000 in honoraria from Drexel during that period. Last January, Coelho acted as a middleman in successful efforts by a group of congressman to persuade the Securities and Exchange Commission to drop its demand that Drexel close down Milken’s junk-bond headquarters in Beverly Hills as part of an expected settlement of a long civil investigation of Drexel. Although Coelho himself did not send a letter to the SEC on Drexel’s behalf, he acknowledged that he enlisted the support of Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.), who did write to the SEC. Coelho said he acted at the request of Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley. [...]

WASHINGTON — Assistant House Majority Leader Tony Coelho (D-Merced) admitted Saturday that he allowed Columbia Savings & Loan’s chief executive, Thomas Spiegel, to buy a $100,000 junk bond for him in 1986 and later repaid Spiegel with money borrowed partly from Columbia. Coelho also acknowledged he failed to disclose the $50,000 loan he obtained from the Beverly Hills-based S&L.; House rules require disclosure of such transactions on annual reports. Coelho’s unusual admission was likely to attract the attention of the House Ethics Committee, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the federal prosecutor in New York, who is investigating Spiegel in connection with the allegedly illegal activities of junk bond king Michael Milken at Drexel Burnham Lambert Inc. In addition, Coelho’s lawyer admitted that his client probably owes the Internal Revenue Service at least a few hundred dollars in unreported back taxes on the transaction. Coelho made a net $6,882 on the bond, which he held for slightly more than four months. The story of the Coelho-Spiegel deal also could bear on the current investigation of Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, a Spiegel intimate whose personal portfolio over the years has included several Drexel-issued junk bonds. Earlier this year, Bradley persuaded Coelho to get California’s two senators and members of the Los Angeles delegation in Congress to intervene on behalf of Drexel in settlement negotiations with the SEC. Coelho, 46, an ambitious and tireless congressman known for his political acumen, asserted that he is not a close friend of Spiegel and, in fact, barely knew him when he bought the junk bond. But Coelho is a personal friend of Milken, who has been accused of securities violations stemming from junk bond trading. Columbia’s assets have more than doubled since 1984 when Spiegel and the bank began investing junk bonds through Milken and Drexel. The activities of Columbia and Spiegel are being investigated in connection with the SEC probe of Milken, according to regulatory papers filed by the thrift last month. In a telephone interview, Coelho said he did not become a friend of Milken until more than a year later. “I did not know Milken at this time,” he said. [...]

Former Yosemite National Park ranger Marshall Scott Connelly pleaded guilty Wednesday to four felony charges involving unlawful sex with teen-age boys. Connelly, 51, stood shackled hand and foot wearing a jail jump suit as he admitted the charges before Judge Vincent J. McGraw. Connelly is facing a maximum sentence of four years and eight months in prison. McGraw set Oct. 23 for sentencing. He has been jailed since July 31, unable to post $700,000 bail set in his case. Connelly's lawyer, Mark Coleman, said the ranger was "anxious to put the matter behind him. "He was concious of the fact other people involved in the case were having to go through embarrassment and emotional trauma and he wanted to put it hehind him for the sake of all involved." Deputy District Attorney Gary Orozco said he was "pretty much satisfied" with the plea agreement by Connelly. "It's tough in all these cases," Orozco said. Connelly was charged with 16 counts involving four teen-age boys and pleaded to one charge involving each boy. Three charges were for unlawful sex, and another was lewd and lascivious conduct. Coleman said Connelly has 28 years' experience as a ranger and enjoyed an excellent reputation in the law enforcement community before his arrest. Until being suspended after his arrest, he worked as a nonuniformed prosecutor in the magistrate's court in Yosemite. Connelly Kept an apartment in Yosemite, but also had a home in Fresno. He was arrested near the home after police reported he had grabbed one youth who was walking in northeast Fresno last month, tied him up and took him to his home to molest him. But a kidnapping charge that was filed as part of the counts against Connelly was dropped during the court proceedings Wednesday. Coleman said there was no factual basis for allegations that Connelly used force in any of the encounters with the boys. Investigators reported that about a year ago, Connelly lured a boy into his pickup, took him home and molested him. After news of the arrest, a third young man told police Commelly molested him two years ago before he turned 18. Police serarching Connelly's home also reported finding video tapes of sexual encounters between the ranger and two of his victims.

Opening the door, Murph discovered his peculiar bespectacled friend, Kenneth Eugene Parnell, smiling furtively as he huddled against the cold. Ken, the Curry Company's night auditor at Yosemite Lodge, a slightly stooped, introverted, self-taught bookkeeper—with no other friends among his fellow employees—and Murph, who made friends with any and all he met, were two of the oddest out of the collection of social misfits, ex-felons, and alcoholics who then made up the bulk of the Curry Company's Yosemite employees.

When he filled out his application with the Curry Company, which operated concessions within the National Park, he neglected to mention his career as a felon, a convicted sex offender, and a mental patient, and apparently, the Curry Company never checked. In May of 1972, he was offered the night auditor's position at Yosemite Lodge. There he met Ervin Murphy and cooked up his scheme to hit the streets of Merced and select himself a son.

Among Parnell's cache of old clothes, magazines, books and letters were other telling items. One was an old phone bill containing a record of a call made three years ago to a Garden Grove business ran by a man named Daniel M. Yert, who Miller identified as one of the nation's major peddlers of child pornography. He currently is imprsioned at San Luis Obispo, and through an intermediary told The Examiner he had never heard of any Kenneth Parnell.

A Federal grand jury in Fresno, 90 miles west of here, has heard allegations that scores of employees of the park concessionaire regularly sell cocaine and other illegal drugs to park visitors; that company funds have been diverted to purchase drugs for employees' use, and that at least one executive of the company attempted to obstruct an investigation of the drug allegations. Seven concessionaire employees were indicted by the grand jury last month on charges of obstruction of justice and related offenses. Agents asserted that the seven beat up a fellow employee who was cooperating with the investigation. [...] [...] a park ranger who is familiar with the investigation characterized the park's problem with organized drug trafficking this way: ''It's big, it runs very deep, and I'll be very surprised that, even with all these F.B.I. agents, that they get to the bottom of it, because there's been such an effort to cover it up.'' [...] No evidence has been made public that implicates the concessionaire, the Yosemite Park and Curry Company, which for more than 70 years has operated hotels, restaurants and other facilities in the park under contract to the National Park Service. But the investigation has focused new attention on the company, which was purchased in August 1973 by MCA Inc., the Los Angeles conglomerate whose major holding is Universal Studios. The Park Service's decision to sanction MCA's acquisition was controversial from the outset. Several senior executives of the company were major campaign contributors to Richard M. Nixon, and critics charged that the company was allowed to take over the concession under terms that reflected its political ties to the Nixon Administration. [...] Four company employees and the records of scores of others have been subpoenaed in the investigation. Edward C. Hardy, the company president, said he was confident that the investigation would clear company officials of any involvement in drug trafficking. [...] According to a senior official of the Park Service who is familiar with the case, the investigation began when two security officers employed by the company told the F.B.I. that two other employees had interfered with them when they sought to investigate drug trafficking among the staff. Among other things, the guards are said to have learned that some employees were holding regular ''sex and drug parties'' in Yosemite Lodge, one of the park's major hotels. On June 26, the body of Roger Banister, 25 years old, who law enforcement officials thought was a cocaine dealer and a source of drugs to dealers here, and whose name has since come up in the investigation, was found near Martinez outside Oakland. Both Mr. Banister and his companion, Cathy Sugrue, 21, had been beaten and shot in the back of the head. Employees Beaten Six weeks later, Kenneth Robinson, a cook at the Yosemite Lodge, was beaten outside a dormitory for employees. According to park officials, he had informed on his roommate, a young woman who had been arrested on charges of possessing cocaine. The same day, another employee was beaten. The seven employees who were indicted in the beatings are scheduled to stand t rial in Fresno next month. The Fresno Bee, the first newspaper to repo rt on the inquiry, has said that investigators were checking allegat ions that in one year more than $2.2 million was embezzled from Yos emite Park and Curry. But Mr. Hardy, in an interview, denied the report. He said that ''shrinkage,'' losses and thefts of money, food and other materials, accounted for about 6 percent of volume, or no more than $300,000 a year, which he said was less than the national average for resort hotels.

Cary Stayner worked at the Cedar Lodge in Yosemite, adjacent to Mariposa County. He and his uncle were long-standing drug dealers. The managers of the Cedar Lodge [they lease the lodge], had been operating a drug operation (Methamphetamine, Heroin, Marijuana) for close to 15 years, and NEVER been arrested for this operation, despite the fact that the Cedar Lodge was a well known drug hangout and distribution center. Most of the high-level officials in Mariposa County were involved with the owners and managers of the Cedar Lodge, and with the Mariposa Sheriff's Department. This cozy alliance has been ongoing for nearly 15 years, with no arrests. AND this operation, which goes far beyond the Cedar Lodge into a California drug syndicate [as named in previous news accounts] has been operating under the auspices of THE COMPANY in nearby Fresno.