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BACKGROUND
On September 17, 2001, Wetherly Capital Group and I (Gary S.
Gevisser) entered into a consulting agreement with a start date
of October 1st, 2001.
In addition to helping review business proposals for this
political lobbyist organization that was attempting to transform
itself into the preeminent investment banking firm on the west
coast, I was to spearhead their California Agricultural Partners
[CAP], a water fund project that would attract international
players like Vivendi Environment who has since changed their
name to Veolia Environment.
Over the course of the next several months Dr. Rod Smith Ph.d,
the preeminent authority on water related issues west of the
Colorado Rockies and I developed a comprehensive business plan
that included the possibility of Vivendi contributing
approximately 42,000 acres of land in the Imperial Irrigation
Distract to this fund which would boost the prospects of getting
funding from other sources such as all the major pension funds
throughout the US with whom Wetherly Capital had relationships.
Without my knowledge Wetherly Capital had their one "renter" Joe
Campos arrange two meetings which were held 10 minutes apart,
with Democratic California Governor Gray Davis on December 28th,
2001.
It is my understanding that Joe Campos attended both meetings.
The first meeting was with the top officials of Vivendi
Environment, Chief Executive Officer Andy Seidal and their
General Counsel Staneck.
The second was with Rod Smith who had in anticipation of the
meeting prepared for Gray Davis a "White Paper" detailing all
the water related problems besetting California.
Rod Smith was unaware that Wetherly Capital Group had been
retained by Bill Simon's investment company to help raise US $
100 million for his Special Situations Fund.
Bill Simon would end up becoming Gray Davis' Republican candidate
for Governor of California and neither Davis nor Simon raised
during the campaign either these most important meetings or the
"White Paper" and nor did Davis follow up with Rod Smith.
When I became aware of how it looked like Vivendi were "dangling
a carrot" in front of Wetherly to have such a high powered
meeting involving a major foreign corporation who like De Beers
do not have a glorious history when it comes democracy and human
rights with the head of the 5th largest economy in the world and
Davis, I told Vicky Schiff that it looked like there was a
"greasing of the wheels" and that I would not go along with it,
and that we could not accept Vivendi as a partner in the CAP.
Joe Campos who was renting space from Wetherly since he was still
operating as a political lobbyist and Wetherly were now wanting
to be investment bankers, goes back a long way with Dan
Weinstein the co- managing director of Wetherly Capital, and
both of them had done lobbying work for Vivendi Environment when
it was better known as US Filter and headed by its founder Dick
Heckman who had purchased this acreage from the Bass Brothers of
Texas who had initially engaged Rod Smith to assist in the
purchase of this asset worth upwards of US $ 100 million.
While to a conglomerate like Vivendi who owned Universal Pictures
the asset was not very significant, to a start up fund and to
have Vivendi as a limited partner it was a most important asset
which Vivendi who were having great financial difficulties in
late 2001 knew they could leverage in getting access to Gray
Davis.
Wetherly knew that they had performed well in getting Vivendi to
meet with the Governor so late in the year where the PR value
alone was priceless, since Vivendi could tout loudly their clout
and which would send a clear message, not so much to their
competitors who are slim and none, but to other politicians
throughout the world.
Consequently, Vicky Schiff and Dan Weinstein while knowing that I
had also had little difficulty in convincing Rod Smith of the
strong appearance of impropriety given all our prior meetings
and discussions regarding Vivendi making this 42,000 acres of
land contribution in the Imperial Irrigation District, a voting
precinct that would prove pivotal in the upcoming November 2002
California Gubernatorial election, and again topping off this
planned "voter fraud" was the fact that Wetherly were
representing Gray Davis' future opponent Bill Simon, were not
going to let go that easily of this "windfall".
At the same time I knew that Vicky Schiff had enough experience
with me that I was not going to go along with their corruption,
and so it did not surprise me that right after I told her "no
go" the share price of Vivendi began a precipitous share price
collapse, beginning on January 3rd, 2002 and continuing for an
uninterrupted period of 280 days; Vivendi and Vivendi
Environment which was 63% owned by Viviendi, losing US $63
billion in market value.
On or around January 11th, 2002, Vicky Schiff called me on my
cell phone to let me know that she, Campos and Weinstein were on
their way to a meeting with Seidel and Stanek at Vivendi's
headquarters in Palm Desert.
I was furious and told her to turn back. She tried suggesting it
was just going to be a "brain storming" meeting without any ties
to those two meetings back on December 28th.
The trio had made up their minds and there was no way I was going
to stop them.
I immediately contacted Rod Smith who tried to reach them but
they never returned his calls.
Right after the meeting Andy Seidel flew to a board meeting of
Vivendi in Paris.
On January 15th, 2002, Vicky Schiff informed me that Wetherly
were "terminating" my consulting agreement but that she was
eager to work things out with me and that I should not "jump the
gun".
On February 8th, 2002 all members of the CAP including Joe Campos
met at Wetherly's new headquarters which were in the offices of
Arden Realty located in the World Savings building in west Los
Angeles.
Not to mention the meeting took place in the office next to that
of the Dick Ziman who is the Chairman of the Board of Wetherly,
and at the same time Ziman was CEO and Chairman of the Board of
Arden Realty which before being sold to GE Capital in 2006 was
the largest Real Estate Investment Trust [REIT] traded on the
New York Stock Exchange.
The meeting began at around 2pm when Dan Weinstein finally showed
up.
Vicky Schiff presented her memo spelling out all the events that
led up to this point in time that was extraordinarily
incriminating and Rod Smith presented his memo spelling out his
activity including the background that led to his "White Paper"
and those two meetings with Governor Gray Davis.
Once I had established that Wetherly Capital were planning on
going ahead with getting Vivendi to contribute the 42,000 acres
I left the meeting with the documents in hand.
On April 3rd, 2002, I received a fax from William H. Jackson
Esq., Wetherly's attorney in which he offered me a settlement of
my consulting agreement which he said never existed even though
I had been paid in accordance with the agreement, and nor did
Jackson make any reference to the "bones of contention" let
alone that most important meeting of Feb. 8th, only saying my
services had been terminated on Jan. 15th.
Suffice to say I never took their settlement offer but Wetherly
Capital did drop pursuing the investment from Vivendi.
In the end the Imperial Irrigation District, under guidance from
Rod Smith, did end up purchasing the land.
Whom ever owns the land, owns the water, owns the bank. |
