A Citizen's Guide to Indiana

The local blogosphere seems to have scooped the main stream media on a filing by the federal government to seize property of alleged Ponzi financier and political mover and shaker Timothy Durham. I read about the filing first at Advance Indiana and Ogden on Politics. Jon Easter at Indy Democrat apparently had the scoop as well via an e-mail from one of his readers. The federal complaint is here.

Carl Brizzi is looking really bad on this thing. He’s the Marion County Prosecutor. He has a close association with Durham. Durham gave him a ton of money to get elected and served as Brizzi’s finance chairman. If the allegations are true, this Ponzi scheme was going on under Brizzi’s nose. The federal complaint alleges that the company was taking money under the pretense of investing in low risk, high yield consumer debt; never actually investing the money; and taking money from new investors to make payments to older investors. And, of course, it appears that Durham was using the company as a piggy bank.

Getting less attention so far is James Cochran, co-director of Fair Financial, who is also part of the allegations. His political contributions have been minor, so far as I can tell – about $1,000 to the Greater Indianapolis Republican Finance Committee.

In any case, the other candidates who took money from Durham will probably get a pass, more or less, unless further facts emerge. Brizzi is in bad shape because he: a) took a ton of money from Durham; b) he has close ties with Durham; and c) he is in charge of prosecuting criminal behavior.

Incidentally, some good stuff over in the Advance Indiana archives I happened upon while Googling around about this article.

#October 2006 entry “Prosecutor’s Office for Sale?”

Brizzi’s single largest contributor by far is local businessman Timothy Durham, who has contributed almost $160,000 to Brizzi’s campaign. Durham is chairman of Obsidian Enterprises, Inc., a private holding company that invests in small and medium-sized companies primarily in the manufacturing and transportation sectors. He’s also a former partner at Ice Miller. He tells Schnitlzer he’s known Brizzi for a long time and pledged to support him before Kennedy entered the race.

#September 2007 comment on an entry about a party Durham threw.

Tim Durham scares the daylights out of me. He’s creepy. Married into the SerVaas family and gets rich. My what a success little Timmy became and then came the divorce. There went his dream of being the “richest man in the world”. Not only would I not let Durham close to my teenage daughter but I wouldn’t so much as trust him to run a lemonade stand. Durham’s a ticking bomb.

Thanksgiving was created, I think it must be said, as a religious holiday. Yet, not being a religious sort, I still find Thanksgiving to be one of the best holidays. The direction of my thanks is, perhaps, more ambiguous, but that doesn’t change the fact that I am thankful for the fact of creation, for having been born in a bountiful place and time, for a good family and for a great deal more. Regardless of whether your thanks is going to a deity, to a particular individual, or to no specific person at all; I think one of the primary benefits of giving thanks is that you stop taking things for granted. It is also an act of humility, a recognition that you are not solely responsible for all that you have. You owe a great deal of what you have and who you are to forces outside of your control. Appreciation and humility are valuable characteristics in a person, and a day devoted to their cultivation is a good one.

And, of course, there is the tremendous amount of good food, time off work, time spent with family and friends, and, with some luck, football. (Even if it is the Lions and the Cowboys.) My plan, as always, is to wallow in dark meat and mashed potatoes. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Moody v. Wellman, LLP (pdf) is a Not for Publication opinion issued by the Indiana Court of Appeals. (“Not for Publication” means it’s not to be cited as precedent — I’m not violating any state secrets by giving out the link). It’s a simple landlord tenant dispute with a tenant who wasn’t represented by counsel. It doesn’t break any new legal ground, but I thought I’d flag it as a nice little snapshot of a case in the life of a small claims court.

It illustrates the ability of a person to tie up a case without having a lawyer or a defense to speak of. He just filed paper after paper alleging one thing or another: he’s looking for a lawyer; the court should appoint him a lawyer; the judge is biased; he needs another continuance, etc. When, a year after the case was filed, it finally got time for him to explain why he didn’t owe the money, he had nothing to say. Cases like this shed a bit of light on why small claims courts can be a little abrupt with litigants and why small claims practitioners can become a little jaded to the people they sue. That doesn’t make it right, of course. I still try to separate the people merely stalling for time from the people with legitimate disputes. I’m sure I don’t always succeed, but it’s worth trying.

Actually, it started last night, but in any case the FBI investigation and arrest of Tim Durham has the Indianapolis blogosphere lighting up (and, contrary to Mr. Shella’s assertion, it’s a bi-partisan pile on – with Advance Indiana and Ogden on Politics featuring prominently.) The IBJ’s Greg Andrews seems to have been taking a prominent role (if not the leading role – I haven’t followed it that closely yet) in reporting on this story. Durham, an Indianapolis businessman, seems to have been playing fast and loose with an Ohio based finance company he owns.

Indianapolis businessman Tim Durham has treated Ohio-based Fair Finance Co. almost like a personal bank since buying it seven years ago, and now Durham, partners and related firms owe it more than $168 million, records show.

Fair, a consumer-loan company, listed no insider loans under prior ownership. The extensive borrowing—which represents 70 percent of Fair’s assets—worries some investment-industry observers at a time parts of Durham’s financial empire are strained.

That would be just another installment of the financial Masters of the Universe financiers being revealed as humbugs behind the curtain except that Durham appears to be an exceptional douchebag in terms of his showiness and he has ties to Indiana’s political establishment, especially – it seems – the Indianapolis Republicans. Durham had been married to the daughter of former City-County Council President and business tycoon Buert Servaas. He has also contributed generously to Marion County Prosecutor, Carl Brizzi ($150,000). But Brizzi isn’t the only one, Durham has contributed to. His money has flowed widely, mainly, but not exclusively (looking at you Rep. Hill ($4,600) to the Indiana Republicans.

Knowing as little as I do about this matter, I still have to admit having my views colored by an immediate schadenfreude. Not because of the guy’s politics, but because of the guy’s lifestyle. I’ll never be rich and flashy. I’m not sure I’d even be comfortable if that lifestyle was available to me. But, at a glance, it does look cool. Instead, I went with a slow and steady career and a committed family life. As with most things that are worthwhile in this life, the path is slow, subtle and, at times, hard (that last applies mostly to work – I haven’t yet seen what is especially hard about family life: pick a good spouse, don’t be a complete jackass, and raise your children as best you can. The rest seems to more or less take care of itself. Perhaps my kids’ teen years will be a rude awakening.)

But, in any case, it’s gratifying when things that look too good to be true turn out to be too good to be true and to see a guy cheating to get ahead brought low. This is all a little preliminary, I guess. Maybe all the negative reporting about this guy is premature and wrong. But there is a lot of smoke all of a sudden, and I wouldn’t be surprised to find that there was fire. All of the local politicians should probably review their connections to the guy, review the contributions they received from him and his organizations, and be prepared to explain themselves.