Battling casino developers suit ends

(Originally published January 22, 2007.)

The fact that there's no casino on Main Street just west of the Interstate 15 interchange in Hesperia isn't the fault of a Houston-based casino development firm, according to a Bakersfield judge.

Superior Court Judge Arthur Wallace granted a motion for summary judgment by Nevada Gold & Casinos, dismissing a claim of tortuous interference by the Chicago-based Rinaldo Corporation.

The Rinaldo Corporation was the original developer attached to a proposed Timbisha-Shoshone tribal casino to be located in Hesperia. But after months of heated political debate, culminating in the Measure X special election in March 2004, and political fallout that arguably ended the political career of the city's longest-serving councilman, Dennis Nowicki, Hesperia still has no casino, more than three years after it was originally discussed by the city council.

Back in October 2004, the Rinaldo Corporation sued Nevada Gold for $50 million after the latter company announced that it had entered into a memorandum of understanding with the tribe, despite the tribe already having an agreement with the Rinaldo Corporation. The tribe's existing internal political differences were exacerbated, according to a Rinaldo legal brief, by Nevada Gold money and the aid of tribal administrator Sheila Torkelson.

On January 8, Wallace granted Nevada Gold's motion for summary judgment, ruling the Rinaldo Corporation's remaining evidence either inadmissible or moot.

"Nevada Gold has presented substantial evidence eliminating any issue of fact on its conduct being a cause of the tribe's termination of the revised development agreement," Wallace's judgment reads in part. "Rinaldo has failed to present evidence to raise a triable issue of fact on that issue."

Even if the tribe had not been split politically, there was still another major obstacle to building a casino in Hesperia, which has never been eliminated: In May 2005, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger issued a proclamation stating that he would never negotiate a compact with any tribe for a casino located in or adjacent to an urbanized area, as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau. The governor specifically listed Hesperia, Victorville and Apple Valley as urbanized areas that would not be receiving casinos in the community or nearby.

Beau Yarbrough can be reached at 956-7108 or at beau@hesperiastar.com.