Darby, Ron | Testimony transcript 11-15-13

Transcript of the Testimony of Ron Darby

Date: November 15, 2013Volume: I

Case: In Re: Joplin Critical Investigation

Printed On: November 30, 2013

Holliday Reporting Service, Inc.Phone: 417-358-4078

Fax: 417-451-1114Email:[email protected]

Internet:

Ron Darby In Re: Joplin Critical Investigation

417-358-4078

Holliday Reporting Service, Inc.

Page 1

IN RE: JOPLIN CRITICAL INVESTIGATION

SWORN STATEMENT OF

RON DARBY

Taken on Friday, November 15, 2013, from 9:33 a.m. to 9:51

a.m., at the law offices of Juddson H. McPherson, LLC, 626

S. Byers, in the City of Joplin, County of Jasper, State of

Missouri, before

SHARON K. ROGERS, C.C.R.650,

a Certified Court Reporter and a Notary Public within and

for the County of Jasper, and State of Missouri.


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APPEARANCES

MR. THOMAS E. LORAINE

Loraine & Associates, LLC

4075 Osage Beach Pkwy., Suite 300

Osage Beach, MO 65065

[email protected]


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S T I P U L A T I O N

IT IS HEREBY STIPULATED AND AGREED that this Sworn

Statement may be taken by steno-mask type recording by

SHARON K. ROGERS, a Certified Court Reporter, and

afterwards reduced into typewriting.

It is further stipulated that the signature of the

witness is hereby waived, and that said Sworn Statement of

said witness shall be of the same force and effect as

though said witness had read and signed Sworn Statement.


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I N D E X

Page/Line

DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. LORAINE . . . 5-4

E X H I B I T S

(sic) - typed as spoken

(ph.) - phonetic


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1 RON DARBY

2 Having been first duly sworn and examined,

3 testified as follows:

4 DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. LORAINE:

5 Q. Mr. Darby, we met here in the hall a little

6 bit earlier for about two minutes and we

7 introduced ourselves and now you said you

8 didn't mind being sworn in and giving me some

9 information, if any, that might be helpful in

10 the three areas that I described to you.

11 Would you please state your present

12 occupation?

13 A. I'm retired from Kimberly Clark Corporation.

14 Q. You had a career with them?

15 A. Yes, sir.

16 Q. What did you do with them, sir?

17 A. I was a National Account Manager.

18 Q. Okay. More recently have you served on

19 something known as the JRC?

20 A. Yes.

21 Q. Tell me what that is.

22 A. It's the Joplin Redevelopment Corporation and

23 prior to the tornado it was a tax deferral

24 group that recommended tax deferrals to the

25 City Council for new businesses coming into


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1 Joplin, and after the tornado it was the

2 financial arm really for the rebuilding of

3 the Wallace-Bajjali group and the City.

4 Q. So after the tornado you've worked closely

5 with Wallace-Bajjali?

6 A. Yes.

7 Q. Were you ever hired by them?

8 A. No, sir, I was strictly a volunteer.

9 Q. A volunteer that worked pretty hard?

10 A. Well, not only myself, but the other members.

11 I mean we had 161 people killed and all the

12 devastation and the injuries and we felt like

13 we had a responsibility to those people to

14 help rebuild Joplin the best we could and

15 that's what we did.

16 Q. I mean there's still a lot of vacant lots

17 obviously, but anything that was going to be

18 rebuilt is already built in the private

19 sector pretty much?

20 A. Well, not really. The private sector along

21 with the Wallace-Bajjali group, I mean

22 there's a lot of private stuff going on and

23 some public stuff, too, so it's kind of a

24 team effort I would describe it as.

25 Q. Have you ever seen the Wallace-Bajjali


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1 contract for the City?

2 A. Yes.

3 Q. I understand that they are somewhere in the

4 rough area of 80 million and the money to be

5 made if things come to full fruit, is that

6 about right, if you know?

7 A. I don't remember if that's exactly the

8 number, but it was substantial. It was

9 probably in that area the way I remember.

10 Q. And what relationship did you have personally

11 to get Wallace-Bajjali to come to the City?

12 A. I had nothing involved in it.

13 Q. Who did?

14 A. The City Council. And what they had was they

15 had a citizen's group that interviewed six or

16 seven or eight, I don't remember exactly how

17 many companies that do that type of thing,

18 and then that group recommended

19 Wallace-Bajjali and then the City Council

20 approved it, but the JRC had nothing to do

21 with it.

22 Q. Okay. Do you know who was on that citizen's

23 group?

24 A. Yeah, a few. There was quite a few on it.

25 The way I remember it was probably 15 to 20


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1 different people that Jane Cage, C-A-G-E I

2 think it is, she was like the chair person of

3 it to my knowledge and Doug Doll who is the

4 President of Arvest Bank, he was on it, and

5 just a group of citizens.

6 Q. Was Mr. Woolston on that?

7 A. Not that I know of. I don't know that,

8 though.

9 Q. Was City Manager Rohr on that?

10 A. No.

11 Q. Did the City or JRC either do any due

12 diligence before the contract was hired with

13 Bajjali other than this citizen's group?

14 A. No.

15 Q. When you were the Director of the JRC give me

16 a time frame? Were you the Director at the

17 time of the tornado itself?

18 A. Yes, sir.

19 Q. And subsequent to that how long did you

20 serve?

21 A. I did two three-year terms. Actually my term

22 for the second three-year stint was over in

23 July, but they asked me to stay until the end

24 of August because we had some things to get

25 done so I stayed an extra month and a half.


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1 Q. So that would have been until 2011 or '12?

2 A. No, 2013.

3 Q. Tell me what phase of your career with the

4 JRC were you in when the tornado hit?

5 A. I was Chairman of the JRC when the tornado

6 hit.

7 Q. And what year was that?

8 A. 2011.

9 Q. So you worked from 2011 to 2013 in charge of

10 the JRC?

11 A. Well, actually as far as Chairman was

12 concerned the way I remember best it was like

13 2010 to 2013. They asked me to stay on

14 another three-year term. I chose not to do

15 that because they'd have to redo the bylaws

16 and I didn't want them to redo the bylaws for

17 me or future either.

18 Q. I understand. A certain amount of time is

19 probably enough for anybody to be in that

20 capacity.

21 A. Yeah, and obvious reasons, you know.

22 Q. Were you on board when the contract for

23 Wallace-Bajjali was actually signed then?

24 A. Was I on --

25 Q. Were you on the JRC?


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1 A. Yes.

2 Q. And you didn't really take any active role in

3 the development of that contract with the

4 JRC?

5 A. No, sir.

6 Q. Did you sit in on any of the meetings?

7 A. I sat in on two of the interviews of two

8 different companies that was held at City

9 Hall. There was probably, I don't know,

10 maybe ten people there plus the companies

11 that they were interviewing and I just

12 listened. One of them was a group out of

13 Kansas City that our ex-Senator - I'm going

14 brain dead from Mexico, Missouri.

15 Q. Oh, you're talking about the U.S. Senator?

16 A. Yes.

17 Q. Kit Bond.

18 A. Kit Bond, yeah, he was an advisor for this

19 company and that was one of the groups that I

20 sat in on, and another one I think they were

21 if I remember correctly out of St. Louis, but

22 that's the only ones. I think they

23 interviewed like six or seven, but I sat in

24 on two of them.

25 Q. Did you sit in regularly after


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1 Wallace-Bajjali was selected on the planning

2 stages?

3 A. No.

4 Q. Who did?

5 A. As far as I know the Council and the City

6 people.

7 Q. You don't have any first-hand information on

8 that?

9 A. No, let me think here. I mean we had a lot

10 of different meetings on property that we

11 were purchasing and the board had five

12 members and we had lost one due to a tragic

13 thing in his family so now we were down to

14 four. And on the bylaws you could have up to

15 thirteen, and the last probably couple of

16 months that I was there the City Council

17 recommended we have seven because we were in

18 a situation where we were down to four and if

19 we had someone miss a meeting for illness or

20 whatever we couldn't vote so that's what

21 happened. But we had a lot of meetings and

22 the people that were at the meetings were the

23 City Manager, the City Attorney, we always

24 had a representative from the City Council.

25 Dr. Rosenberg was our Council representative,


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1 but he had some health issues so Mr. Scearce

2 filled in for him for awhile and then Benji

3 came back, but we had Leslie there, the

4 Financial Director, and so on, but we had a

5 group and all the minutes and so on and the

6 Wallace-Bajjali group was there, their

7 representation and so on. And what we did is

8 we voted on whether to buy property or not,

9 individual properties.

10 Q. Was Woolston involved in that?

11 A. No, sir.

12 Q. You mentioned that the City Manager was

13 there. Who ran these meetings?

14 A. I ran them.

15 Q. Your recollection is both the City Attorney

16 and the City Manager were there at those

17 meetings?

18 A. At every meeting. I think Brian missed one

19 meeting, he was on vacation, but his

20 assistant, Peter Edwards, was there in his

21 place. And we had other people from the

22 City, not just those people. Tony - I can't

23 think of his name - he was there, and we had

24 probably six or seven different people from

25 the City there at most every meeting.


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1 Q. You basically, your company, JRC, is just a

2 holding company?

3 A. Right.

4 Q. To hold the land?

5 A. Basically, yes.

6 Q. And you are fully owned by the City of

7 Joplin?

8 A. No. Well, I guess you could say that. It's

9 people that were appointed by the City

10 Council to serve on that board.

11 Q. So I mean it's totally controlled by the City

12 Council?

13 A. Yes.

14 Q. And you're not doing any business other than

15 for the City for this particular purpose?

16 A. That's correct.

17 Q. Had Wallace-Bajjali assembled property for

18 JRC?

19 A. Had they recommended property for us to

20 purchase?

21 Q. Yes.

22 A. Yes, sir.

23 Q. Do they get a commission on that?

24 A. Yes.

25 Q. And what is their commission?


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1 A. 5.75 percent.

2 Q. Has Mr. Woolston, himself, has he worked on

3 obtaining property to be sold to you?

4 A. No.

5 Q. Never seen him?

6 A. No.

7 Q. Has his company Four State --

8 A. Four State Homes.

9 Q. Did they assemble property for you?

10 A. Well, let me see if I understand what you

11 mean. The property that we purchased on 20th

12 and Connecticut, there's a big parcel piece

13 of property in there that the library, movie

14 theater, retail area.

15 Q. Yes.

16 A. Yes, down to the anchor of the grocery store

17 that's going in there, Four State Homes owned

18 a lot of that property in there and, you

19 know, to clear things up there was eight

20 different banks that loaned us a million

21 dollars each. Arvest Bank was the lead bank

22 on the administrative part of it. And every

23 piece of property that we bought as a group

24 we voted on, number one. Number two, there

25 was at least one to two appraisals on every


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1 piece of property. Then Arvest was the lead

2 bank, but the other seven banks involved,

3 they went all through the documentation of

4 the purchase, also. So to answer your

5 question Wallace-Bajjali negotiated with the

6 people that owned the property and then they

7 came to us with whether we would buy it or

8 not buy it. Most of the stuff they

9 recommended we did purchase, but some we

10 didn't.

11 Q. Did Four State also serve that purchase?

12 A. We were never involved personally with Four

13 State Homes at all.

14 Q. Do you know if Four State sold property to

15 Wallace-Bajjali?

16 A. Not that I know of, no.

17 Q. So if Four State purchased property, let's

18 just say if they did, they would have then

19 assembled it and bought it for

20 Wallace-Bajjali you don't know that?

21 A. No, I don't know that.

22 Q. Assuming there was a commission paid for that

23 service you wouldn't have any knowledge of

24 that?

25 A. No.


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1 Q. So the only commission you knew about is the

2 one you referenced that Wallace-Bajjali

3 received?

4 A. Yeah, that was negotiated with the City

5 Council. It wasn't the JRC, we had nothing

6 to do with that, that's what they were paid,

7 but that was the contract they had with the

8 City.

9 Q. Did the City Manager run the City business at

10 the meetings with you?

11 A. No.

12 Q. So you basically ran these meetings?

13 A. Yes, sir.

14 Q. What role did the City Manager play?

15 A. Well, Mark was there at every meeting. He

16 just more listened than anything. I usually

17 asked him if he had any comments at the end

18 of the meeting and normally he didn't so more

19 as an observer than anything I would classify

20 that as.

21 Q. As far as the set up of the arrangement with

22 the JRC you didn't really have anything to do

23 with how the system was set up to land bank

24 the property?

25 A. No, sir.


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1 Q. And you really don't know whether the City

2 Manager had any role in that?

3 A. Not that I know of, no.

4 Q. As far as you know this 15 or 20 people did

5 whatever work they did in selecting the

6 company, that Wallace-Bajjali eventually

7 received that contract, and the next thing

8 you know you're involved with the acquisition

9 of property?

10 A. Yeah, that's who they selected and that's who

11 we work with.

12 Q. Is there anything else that you know that -

13 your name has come up to me and I really

14 don't know how or why it did, but is there

15 anything else that you know that you think I

16 should know because of the topics I'm looking

17 at?

18 A. Well, what I know I mean what you described

19 earlier was there involvement with Mr.

20 Woolston, and he had no involvement with the

21 JRC at all while I was there, and I was there

22 for six years, over six years. As far as Mr.

23 Scearce other than he filling in - we always

24 had a Council representative every meeting

25 and Dr. Rosenberg has prostate cancer


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1 problems so he was out taking medical

2 treatment so that's why Scearce filled in for

3 him, but we always had at least one

4 representative from the Council there at the

5 meetings and tried to work as a team, you

6 know, the City and Wallace-Bajjali and the

7 other people involved.

8 Q. You of course know nothing about Bill

9 Scearce's involvement in gambling or anything

10 of that nature?

11 A. No, I've known Bill for many years, but I'm

12 not involved in that at all.

13 Q. Okay. Those are my topics. I thank you for

14 coming in here. I think we're essentially

15 done here unless there's something else that

16 you know that I don't know.

17 A. No, I think we've covered everything that I

18 know.

19 Q. All right. Thank you very much for your

20 courtesy, sir. Appreciate you coming in.

21 A. Thank you, sir.

22

23 (SWORN STATEMENT CONCLUDED)

24

25


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1


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REPORTER'S CERTIFICATE

STATE OF MISSOURI

ss.

COUNTY OF JASPER

I, SHARON K. ROGERS, Certified Court Reporter in the

State of Missouri, do certify that pursuant to the

foregoing Stipulation the witness came before me on the

15th day of November, 2013, was duly sworn by me, and was

examined. That examination was then taken by me by

steno-mask recording and afterwards transcribed; said Sworn

Statement is subscribed by the witness as hereinbefore set

out on the day in that behalf aforesaid and is herewith

returned.

I further certify that I am not counsel, attorney, or

relative of either party, or clerk, or stenographer of

either party or of the attorney of either party, or

otherwise interested in the event of this suit.

________________________

SHARON K. ROGERS, CCR-650

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Darby, Ron | Testimony transcript 11-15-13

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