Uresti quitting Senate
It’s ‘statesman thing to do’ after conviction
State Sen. Carlos Uresti announced Monday that he will step down from office Thursday, saying it was “the statesman thing to do” four months after his criminal conviction.
Uresti is scheduled to be sentenced next Tuesday after being found guilty in February by a federal jury on 11 felony charges in connection with his involvement in a now-defunct San Antonio oil field services company that defrauded investors.
Uresti has indicated that he will appeal his conviction. He could have remained in office until exhausting his appeals.
In an interview Monday, Uresti said he was in shock after the verdict when he vowed not to resign. After mulling the issue with friends and family, he said, he realized that stepping down “is the right thing to do for my family, for me and for my district.”
Uresti timed his resignation to Thursday because it’s the 21st anniversary of his first election to state office.
“It’s been two decades, and I never thought it would go by so quickly,” he said. He added that he planned to serve only 10 or so years but became enamored with meeting people and finding ways to prevent child abuse.
It’s an unceremonious end to Uresti’s political career of more than two decades, first in the state House and then the state Senate.
The San Antonio Democrat has headed a mini-political dynasty on the South Side, with brothers state Rep. Tomas Uresti and Albert Uresti, Bexar County’s tax assessorcollector, following him into public office. But less than two weeks after Uresti’s conviction, Tomas Uresti was defeated for
his seat by Leo Pacheco in the Democrats’ March primary.
Carlos Uresti, 54, said he is asking Gov. Greg Abbott to call a special election in November to fill the vacant Senate District 19 seat. His term was set to end in January 2021.
“The district has had somewhat of a disadvantage as this has been going forward, and I think people deserve to have their voice, and have a strong voice,” said former U.S. Rep. Pete Gallego, a Democrat who has entered the race to succeed Uresti. “The sooner that happens, the better.”
Democratic state Rep. Roland Gutierrez, who also is vying for the seat, said in a statement that Uresti’s resignation “means one of the saddest, most embarrassing stories of Texas politics finally comes to an end.” He used the statement as a fundraising call for his campaign.
Republican Pete Flores, who lost to Uresti in 2016, on Monday announced that he will run again for the seat.
Uresti was convicted of defrauding investors in FourWinds Logistics, which bought and sold sand used in fracking for oil production before the company collapsed in
2015. He served as the company’s outside general counsel, held a 1 percent ownership interest and recruited investors.
The lawmaker has maintained his innocence, but his indictment and subsequent conviction cast a long shadow over his career.
“During the last year, some of the media has been unfair, inaccurate or sensational when it was hurtful, not necessary or simply not true,” Uresti said in announcing his resignation. “Nonetheless, I know what I did and what I did not do.
“It has always been my intention to do what was right for the constituents of District 19 and for Texas,” he added. “To the extent any of you feel I let you down, please grant me forgiveness.”
Uresti is staring at a prison sentence that could range from eight to 12 years, some attorneys have told the San Antonio Express-News. Plus, prosecutors say he could owe more than $3 million in restitution to his victims.
The decision to voluntarily leave office has nothing to do with hoping that the judge will look favorably on him at sentencing next week, Uresti said.
Uresti still stands to pocket a hefty government pension that likely will be more than $80,000 a year. A state law that took effect last year bars lawmakers convicted of certain felonies from receiving their government pension, but it doesn’t apply to Uresti because his FourWinds crimes aren’t covered by the law. He was convicted of securities fraud, conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering, among other charges.
Meanwhile, Uresti is scheduled to stand trial in October in a separate case in which he’s accused of splitting $850,000 in bribe payments with a county judge in Reeves County over a medical services contract at a jail in West Texas. Uresti has denied the charges.
San Antonio attorney Mikal Watts, one of Uresti’s lawyers in the
Reeves County case, called the resignation a “sad day marking the end of a brilliant public service career.”
Watts said he is hopeful that Uresti’s conviction will be overturned on appeal. Watts was barred by Senior U.S. District Judge David Ezra from representing Uresti in the FourWinds case because of a conflict of interest, a ruling that will be part of the appeal.
“When the story is finally written, his good deeds will wildly outshine the painful event of being convicted based on the crimes of (FourWinds CEO) Stan Bates,” Watts said. Bates pleaded guilty to eight felonies, including securities fraud and money laundering, rather than stand trial with Uresti and FourWinds consultant Gary Cain.
The jury also found Cain guilty of nine felonies. He is scheduled to be sentenced June 27. Bates’ sentencing is set for Aug. 6.
Two months ago, Uresti surrendered his license to practice law in lieu of facing disciplinary action from the the State Bar of Texas. He had been an attorney for more than 25 years.
This month, Uresti got court approval to sell his longtime law office building at 924 McCullough Ave. for slightly less than $1 million. More than half the proceeds are slated to go to his victims.
Uresti also is in the process of selling his Helotes home, Watts said. It’s listed for $1.7 million. Uresti can’t sell any of his assets without court approval.
Calls for Uresti’s resignation, from both sides of the political aisle, followed his February conviction. Uresti, though, vowed to keep his Senate seat during his appeal.
Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick removed Uresti from committee assignments. Uresti had served as vice chairman of the Health & Human Services Committee and had posts on the Education, Finance, and Veteran Affairs & Border Security panels.
Uresti chose not to testify during his nearly five-week trial. Prosecutors, though, played for jurors recordings of interviews that Uresti gave to the Express-News. The newspaper first chronicled Uresti’s involvement in FourWinds in 2016.
The FourWinds case revealed that Uresti had a sexual relationship with a female client and later got her to invest with the company. The married Uresti disputed the affair, however.
The client, Denise Cantu, had hired Uresti to represent her in litigation after the deaths of two of her children in a 2010 vehicle wreck. Uresti brought Watts into that case and secured Cantu a $2.5 million settlement.
Uresti later advised Cantu to invest some of the money with FourWinds, a risky startup. He told her the investment was “guaranteed” and “good as gold” and that she could get her money back if she wasn’t satisfied, she testified during the trial. She ended up losing $800,000 of her $900,000 investment.
Uresti received a
$27,000 commission on her investment even though he never registered as a securities broker, one of the crimes he was found guilty of in February. His consulting company also stood to get a cut of the profits earned by the investors he brought in, which the investors testified was not disclosed to them.
Cantu testified that Uresti was her counsel but became her friend, financial adviser and ultimately lover. The pair exchanged sexually explicit text messages. A week after Uresti’s conviction, his wife, Lleanna, filed court papers to end their nearly six-year union.
In a resignation statement, Uresti said his biggest achievement in office was forming the Blue Ribbon Task Force to combat child abuse and passing laws “that helped to protect children from abuse and neglect.”