O.C. INSIDER
by Rick Reiff
Chriss Street is a brash guy and a bold investor, so why should he be any different in disputes? The Newport Beach financier, one of the first and loudest critics of then-OC treasurer Bob “Bankruptcy” Citron, has let the subpoenas fly in a breach-of-contract action against former partners Kurt Stabel and Ray Pentz. Cooling his heels outside a mediator’s hearing room in Costa Mesa last week was current county treasurer John Moorlach, apparently called as a character witness for Street. Also subpoened were investment specialists who have had dealings or just discussions with the defendants, including Alan Beimfohr and Mark Moehlman. Also called were OCBJ reporter Rajiv Vyas and editor Mike Lyster. Vyas and Lyster agreed to answer questions about an OCBJ story on the contract dispute, but claimed a constitutional right not to testify about the news-gathering process. Vyas refused to tell Street’s lawyer Darryl Sheetz who gave him documents concerning a Labor Department audit of a Fruehauf Trailer pension plan, of which Street is a trustee. Stabel and Pentz said they left Street’s firm fearing the audit would sully their reputations; Street said the audit was routine and the pair left only after he refused to buy them out for $250,000 each …
Fox has outbid NBC for pilot rights to “Arrested Development,” a comedy series by director Ron Howard and OC-raised writer Mitchell Hurwitz about a rich-but-challenged Orange County family (natch) …
Identity crisis: If the city of Anaheim acquires The Grove, expect yet another name change for a struggling venue that also has been called Tinseltown and Sun Theater …
Holy Hollywood: Wolfgang Puck signature coffee is now served at Crystal Cathedral …
VCer Bob Hoff turned 50 dancing to Creedence Clearwater Revisited at the Crazy Horse …
Dilday Brothers Mortuary in Huntington Beach offers live private broadcasts of funeral services via the Internet …
He’s back (again): Arnold Schwarzenegger, stumping for lieutenant governor candidate Bruce McPherson, at the Santa Ana home of Barbara and Mark Chapin Johnson, Thursday, $500 a head.
Jason Niedle, of Printmedia Communications and the Young Entrepreneurs Organization, with the OCBJ at 19,000 feet up Mt. Kiliminjaro. He and nine other local businessmen ended summer by scaling Africa’s highest peak and going on a six-day safari. How did you vacation? (right).
