Bribe figure avoids prison in HOA takeover scheme

Sami Robert Hindiyeh is best known in the scheme to take over and defraud homeowners associations for plotting to bribe a community management company employee.

On Tuesday Hindiyeh, 57, who lives in Southern California, was sentenced to three years of supervised release and ordered to pay a share of $6,000 in restitution. He pleaded guilty in May 2012 to one felony count of conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud.

The bribe plot unfolded in the summer of 2008 as part of an effort to rig HOA elections at Mission Pointe, a condominium development in southeast Las Vegas. At the time, then-construction company boss Leon Benzer was deep into the scheme to take over a dozen HOAs and funnel construction defect repair work to his company.

Hindiyeh served as a middleman in the bribe conspiracy for Benzer and his right-hand man, Ralph Priola, who was secretly recorded giving an undercover FBI informant $20,000 in cash meant for the community management employee. Priola had hidden the bundle of $100 bills inside a baby wipes container.

Hindiyeh is one of 20 cooperating defendants being sentenced this week, including five on Tuesday, in the largest public corruption case federal authorities have brought in Southern Nevada.

A total of 38 defendants pleaded guilty in the investigation, which became public in September 2008 with FBI-led raids across the valley. Four more defendants, including attorney Keith Gregory, were convicted by a federal jury in March.

The Mission Pointe election was canceled after the sweeping raids.

“I’m sorry for what I’ve done,” Hindiyeh told U.S. District Judge James Mahan before he was sentenced. “I was in a bad place, a dark place, in my life.”

Federal prosecutors had recommended up to six months in prison for Hindiyeh.

Several other defendants who pleaded guilty to the conspiracy charge and who cooperated with prosecutors also avoided prison time, including Michelle DeLuca, the office manager for Benzer’s Silver Lining Construction Company.

A tearful DeLuca, who also was a Benzer-controlled board member at Sunset Cliffs, apologized for her actions.

Mahan said she deserved a break because of her extensive help to the government and ordered her to serve three years of supervised release and pay a share of $10,000 in restitution.

Denise Keser, who ran a community management company Benzer set up to gain control of Chateau Nouveau, was sentenced by Chief U.S. District Judge Gloria Navarro to three years of supervised release.

Navarro also ordered Keser, who cooperated early in the long-running investigation and wore a hidden recording device, to pay $16,000 in restitution to Chateau Nouveau’s HOA and write a letter of apology to homeowners.

Glenn Brown, a member of Benzer’s “security team” who helped rig elections at Chateau Nouveau and Vistana, was ordered to serve two years of supervised release and pay a share of $5,295 in restitution.

Charles Hawkins, a Benzer employee who became a board member at Vistana, was not as lucky as the other defendants.

Mahan sentenced Hawkins to six months in prison and three years of supervised release with six months of home confinement. He also ordered Hawkins to pay a share of $147,884 in restitution.

Benzer, who pleaded guilty and is to be sentenced later this year, targeted HOAs through a network of straw buyers and systematically took control of several HOA boards through fraud and deceit, including the rigging of elections, prosecutors have alleged.

Priola also pleaded guilty and is waiting to be sentenced.

Contact Jeff German at jgerman@reviewjournal.com or 702-380-8135. Find him on Twitter: @JGermanRJ