The State Bar of California filed disciplinary charges last week against a former Los Angeles city official in connection with an alleged quid pro quo deal involving a city contract.
William Funderburk, then serving as vice president of the L.A. Department of Water and Power Board of Commissioners, approved the $30-million deal around the same time that he solicited and received free legal work from the attorney who was awarded the contract, State Bar prosecutors alleged.
Funderburk lied about accepting the free legal work, valued at more than $30,000, during an 2020 interview with the U.S. sttorney’s office, and he also illegally solicited a political contribution, according to Bar prosecutors.
Funderburk is the first former city official to be charged by the State Bar in relation to a massive scandal at the DWP and city attorney’s office involving corrupt attorneys and illicit payments.
He faces five counts, including committing acts involving moral turpitude, dishonesty and corruption. If he is convicted, the State Bar could disbar him, suspend his law license or put him on probation.
The State Bar’s top prosecutor, Chief Trial Counsel George Cardona, said in a statement Wednesday that Funderburk “had an ethical and legal obligation to ensure that he did not take actions that might appear to be influenced by any conflicts of interest or gifts that he received.”
“Bill did nothing wrong,” said Funderburk’s attorney, Jan Handzlik. “Once the full story is known, we feel confident Bill will be exonerated.”
An environmental attorney, Funderburk is well-known in L.A. Democratic circles and was appointed to the DWP board in 2013 by then-Mayor Eric Garcetti, stepping down in 2018.
State Bar prosecutors said that on June 6, 2017, Funderburk voted with other DWP board members to award a cybersecurity contract to Aventador, a company owned by Paul Paradis, then a New York attorney.
Before the vote, Funderburk had exchanged text messages with Paradis about a legal case involving Funderburk’s firm, according to bar prosecutors, and had also requested that Paradis provide legal services.
In the hallway before the vote at DWP headquarters, Funderburk ran into Paradis and expressed his appreciation for Paradis’ assistance with the legal matter, bar prosecutors said.
Funderburk said to Paradis words to the effect of, “You take care of me, I take care of you,” according to prosecutors.
“Paradis understood this statement to mean that respondent would vote in favor of the Aventador contract if Paradis and [Paradis’ law firm] continued to provide respondent with unpaid legal services and assistance,” prosecutors wrote.
Paradis and his law firm provided 36.5 hours of free work worth $31,477.50 to Funderkburk from May to August 2017, according to prosecutors, who described how Paradis and his law partner reviewed court documents, gave analysis and held meetings with Funderburk’s team.
Paradis was a central player in the DWP scandal, which has its roots in the disastrous rollout of a new DWP billing system launched in 2013. While working for the city attorney’s office, he secretly drafted a class-action lawsuit against the city in an effort to quickly settle all the legal claims from customers over the billing errors.
He pleaded guilty in 2021 to a federal bribery charge connected to the sham lawsuit but unrelated to his dealings with Funderburk, receiving a reduced sentence of 33 months in exchange for his cooperation.
His plea agreement described how an unnamed DWP commissioner accepted free legal work from him, with details indicating that Funderburk was the commissioner.
Handzlik reiterated on Wednesday that Funderburk had never received free legal work from Paradis.
The Times on Wednesday reviewed three emails from 2017 in which Funderburk or employees at his law firm asked Paradis to review documents related to one of the firm’s cases.
In one of the emails, dated Aug. 6, 2017, Funderburk instructed an employee at his law firm to send a document to Paradis and his law partner.
“[The brief] still needs work but I want their input,” Funderburk wrote.
Handzlik said Funderburk had merely asked several lawyers, including Paradis, for “routine professional courtesies.”
“It was only much later, while implicating others in his massive scheme, that Paradis characterized Bill’s conduct as improper and valued his ‘legal services’ at more than $30,000,” Handzlik said. “In fact, the Aventador resolution would have passed with or without Bill’s vote. It would have been approved by a vote of 4-0, even without his vote.”
Funderburk was never criminally charged or otherwise implicated in the sham lawsuit scheme.
In an Oct. 16, 2020, interview with federal prosecutors, Funderburk did not disclose the legal work that Paradis did for him or that Paradis had purchased meals for him about five to seven times, bar prosecutors alleged.
Nor did Funderburk reveal to the government that he had directed a campaign contribution from Paradis to U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D-New York), according to bar prosecutors.
An email reviewed by the Times shows that in October 2017, Funderburk forwarded Paradis and another attorney an invitation for a fundraiser for Gillibrand that Funderburk was co-hosting. In the email, Funderburk instructed Paradis and the other attorney to contact a Gillibrand finance advisor.
Under city ethics laws, city commissioners cannot solicit contributions from people who have had a matter before their commission in the previous 12 months.
Handzlik denied that Funderburk had solicited a contribution from Paradis and argued that the city ethics rule did not apply to federal candidates. He also said his client was truthful when interviewed by the U.S. attorney’s office.
In another case related to the DWP scandal, the State Bar on Wednesday announced a proposed 30-day license suspension for Richard Tom, a city attorney who worked on litigation stemming from the utility’s billing disaster.
Bar prosecutors alleged that Tom made “false and misleading statements” in a court declaration and in his deposition. Tom did not respond to a request for comment.