Enochs to Serve Weekends in Jail

Enochs to serve weekends in jail

Rocky Salmon
Special to the Valley News

Friday, February 13th, 2009.
Issue 07, Volume 9.


Warnie Enochs, longtime City Council member and self-proclaimed “champion of the people,” will serve weekends in jail and avoid prison time after a jury convicted him on 12 charges including forgery and preparing false records.

The 59-year-old electrician must attend anger management classes during a five-year probationary period and serve 180 days in county jail. The sentence was handed down Feb. 6 by Judge Douglas E. Weathers.

In his ruling, Weathers said Enochs acted above the law but did not deserve prison time because no one was harmed.

Enochs received more than 35 letters of support from people in the community.

In a probation report, Officer Thomas Singer said Enochs’ actions were “unseemly” and “even disgusting.”

In the report, Enochs’ ex-wife, Julia, told Singer that Warnie shouldn’t be sentenced to prison because he “does not care about the damage done to her and never will.”

Tile contractor George Osmond, a central party in the case, said the prosecution was “overkill.”

Warnie Enochs was elected to City Council in 1995 and served for three years. He lost his attempt for a fourth term during the November elections.

The electrician was arrested in August 2006 after a Riverside County district attorney’s office investigator talked with Julia, who was at that time married to Warnie.

Warnie Enochs was arrested and charged with 13 counts ranging from forgery to falsifying records.

A majority of the convictions were tied to the new home on Trilogy Trails Lane in Murrieta.

Prosecutors said that from late 2003 to February 2005, Enochs forced a longtime business partner to file fake documents in court and threatened others to save thousands of dollars during divorce proceedings.

During the trial, Enochs argued that it was all part of a bad divorce and name-calling.

The district attorney’s office began their investigation when Julia told prosecutors she believed her husband committed fraud during their divorce.

DA investigator Gerald Fox spent 18 months digging through records and interviewing business associates.

Fox said in court documents that Julia came to the DA’s office after she noticed a problem with a letter submitted in court that supported her husband in the divorce proceedings.

The letter was signed by tile contractor George Osmond, but Julia Advertisement
told prosecutors she recognized the signature as her husband’s.

Fox interviewed Osmond, who said he did not sign the letter.

He added that Enochs refused to pay $1,800 that was owed to Osmond for tile work unless Osmond submitted a statement to the court that Julia was having an affair with a man Osmond employed.

Court records show that Enochs believes his wife had an affair at the end of their 15-year marriage.

Osmond told Fox that he didn’t know if Enoch’s allegations were true so he would not sign the letter. Enochs then threatened to break Osmond’s legs if he wouldn’t write Julia was having an affair.

Fox then looked into a $48,000 mechanic’s lien placed on the home by roofer Dan Williams.

Fox said several of the invoices had problems that were common in fraud cases, according to court documents.

Williams admitted to falsifying the contracts and invoices at the request of Warnie Enochs, Fox said in the documents.

Williams said he inflated the cost from $30,000 to $48,000.

Fox said in court documents that Enochs asked Fox to create a fake contract and had it backdated to match the time when construction was going on.

The plan was to lower the value of his new house so his wife would get less money in the divorce proceedings, court records show.

Enochs was also convicted of forging a police officer’s signature on a fix-it ticket.

In August 2002, Enochs was stopped twice by a San Bernardino Sheriff’s Deputy while entertaining friends on a boat on Big Bear Lake.

During the first stop, Enochs flashed a Murrieta Councilman’s badge and told the officer he was an elected official. Enochs was given a warning.

The next day, Enochs was stopped again for having an expired registration and this time he was given a fix-it ticket, court records show.

Julia Enochs told Fox that her husband asked her to use a fake name and sign off on the ticket but she refused.

Instead, he signed it with the signature “Steve Baxter.” Murrieta Police officials told Fox they never employed a Steve Baxter.

Jurors took a day of deliberating to convict Enochs. He was acquitted of an extortion charge.