LAW KICKBACKS AND CANDLELIGHT

In November of last year, Sandra Moss’s company, Candlelight Cleaning, won three contracts worth $500,000- the largest minority-owned business contracts in the history of Dallas County-to provide janitorial services for forty-two county buildings. During the first couple of months Moss received compliments and good job evaluations. Then, she says, something went wrong.

In a lawsuit, Moss is alleging that John Luster, contract manager for the county, approached Ron Smith, project manager of Candlelight, and asked for $500 every two weeks. In exchange, Luster promised he would do what he could to build up his fellow blacks in the eyes of his boss, Tom Means, who is white. Smith paid the money, but when he told Moss what was going on, she ordered the payments stopped. At that point, Smith says, Luster told him that Moss would get no more good reports and that her contract would be canceled.

Moss says Luster began calling her very early almost every morning, demanding that she come to a particular building to look at what turned out to be trivial problems. The harassment escalated, she says, when Luster posed as a manager of Candlelight and told thirteen employees they were fired.

Moss’s business went down in flames on May 15 when the County Commissioners Court revoked her contracts, citing poor performance records.

Angry, Moss filed a complaint with the DA’s office and later filed suit against Dallas County, Luster, and Means. In the ensuing investigation, Luster made statements to the DA’s office that led to the twenty-five-year employee being fired by county commissioners; the next day, he was indicted for demanding a bribe. Luster and Means both refuse to discuss the alleged kickback scheme. Tom Keever, chief of the civil section of the DA’s office, also refused to comment on the case.

Although Moss feels that the firing and indictment of Luster vindicates her position, she hasn’t gotten her contract back and she says her reputation has been soiled. “It’s been a nightmare,” she says. “And it keeps getting worse.” -J.P.