Rep. Duncan D. Hunter, R-Alpine, turned to a long-time acquaintance of his father and congressional predecessor, Duncan L. Hunter, to arrange the loan he used to repay his campaign for nearly $49,000 in questionable expenditures.

The broker has had a decades-long career after shooting to death a business partner who was having an affair with his wife in the 1970s. Hunter was unaware of that history, and the broker said it was irrelevant to the transaction.

Joseph Ignacio Salas, Jr., 85, is a licensed real estate broker and designated officer for the the San Diego-based lending firm Salas Financial. He facilitated the $57,281 private loan Hunter and his wife, Margaret, secured with equity from their home in Alpine on Nov. 2, Salas confirmed this week.

Salas, who said he has known Hunter’s father for many years, arranged for an independent private investor, Flor Roldan, to underwrite the loan, and for Statewide Foreclosure Services to hold the deed to Hunter’s home in trust until the loan was repaid. Only the names of Statewide and Roldan appear on loan documents filed with the county.


Hunter, 40, used the money from the loan to repay $48,651 to his political campaign on Nov. 4, according to records on file with the Federal Election Commission. The money reimbursed the campaign for a long list of personal, mistaken, and inadequately-supported expenditures in 2015 and 2016, according to commission filings.

The reimbursements included payments to utility companies, a dentist, a nail salon, Albertsons, Costco, Walmart, Home Depot, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Trader Joe’s and Abercrombie & Fitch — as well as 32 airline transactions, a hotel in Italy and the Arizona Grand Resort, according to campaign reports.

Previously: Hunter

In April, Hunter had reimbursed the campaign for $12,000 to repay other personal and mistaken expenditures, including unspecified purchases at a surf shop and a garage door for his home. Spokesman Joe Kasper said last month that many of the payments for which Hunter has now reimbursed more than $60,000 were legitimate and allowable, but Hunter repaid them to be safe.

Federal law does not allow campaign money to be spent for personal benefit, to guard against undue influence by contributors. Many donors to Hunter’s campaign, which has raised $1.1 million since January 2015, came from defense and transportation companies that have a stake in decisions made by committees on which the congressman serves.


Hunter repaid the $57,281 private loan upon the recent sale of his home in Alpine, Kasper told The San Diego Union-Tribune. A record of the repayment was recorded with county property officials Dec. 13. No records on file with the county as of Wednesday described the terms of the loan, such as the schedule for repayment, interest rates, or any associated fees.

The property was listed for sale Oct. 18 for $640,000, and sold for $600,000, according to the real estate website Redfin.com. A grant deed recorded Dec. 9 with the County of San Diego lists the buyers as married couple Michael and Lisa Savage. The record does not indicate a sale price.

The property’s current tax assessment lists its value at $648,784, according to records on file Tuesday with the County of San Diego.

Duncan and Margaret Hunter bought the home in 2009 for $595,000, according to public records.


Hunter’s most recent personal financial disclosure report on file with the U.S. House of Representatives showed the congressman had no bank accounts or similar assets worth more than $1,000 as of Dec. 31, 2015. The disclosure report also listed two mortgages on Hunter’s home in Alpine. Both were in 2009 from Navy Federal Credit Union. One was for between $15,001 and $50,000, the other for between $500,001 and $1 million.

Kasper said last month that Hunter and his wife had been planning to sell their home for some time. He did not answer questions about where the family would next live. Hunter, an early supporter of Donald Trump for president, has been mentioned for a possible appointment in the administration.

The deed of trust for the Nov. 2 loan listed Duncan and Margaret Hunter’s address not at their home, but at the Alpine home of Hunter’s parents.

A liberal-leaning Washington D.C.-based nonprofit, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, raised questions about the loan after the Union-Tribune reported on it last month.


A spokesman said it was important to confirm that a private individual lender does not have any relationship with an officeholder that might run afoul of ethics rules — and that the lender didn’t give the officeholder special terms for repayment or an extra-low interest rate.

Kasper said Hunter qualified for the loan and accepted it at fair market terms. He said Hunter did not know the investor who lent the money, listed on separate county documents as Flor Roldan or Flor Rolidan.

Reached by phone last month, the woman said she was a private investor, and declined to comment further.

Salas said he didn’t think the woman knew the Hunters or had any connection to them before she made the loan. He said she was one of hundreds of people who put up money for loans that his company brokers. She had relatively little experience making such investments, so Salas thought a low-risk, short-term financial commitment seemed like a good opportunity to get her started.


Salas said he has known the elder Duncan Hunter, 68, for decades, and that they volunteered for a nonprofit together in the past.

Kasper said Hunter was unaware of Salas’s criminal history, but he doubts it would have changed his decision to do business with Salas.

“Rep. Hunter believes in second chances,” Kasper said. “If something happened 40 years ago and somebody’s turned things around in the time since, then that’s a good thing. It doesn’t mean he or she should automatically be disqualified from making an honest living.”

Salas said he did not tell the younger Duncan Hunter about his criminal history because their business engagement was expected to be brief, and his past conviction was irrelevant. He said he discloses his criminal past to long-term investors.


“I didn’t steal the money, I didn’t kill anybody to get the money, and Duncan Hunter wasn’t involved in that case, which was a long time ago,” Salas said. “Why should I tell him? We’re not going to church or confession.”

Salas has been a fully-licensed broker in good standing with the California Bureau of Real Estate since 2005, according to the agency’s website. Salas lost his license in 1978 because of his second-degree murder conviction in 1973.

According to the bureau’s records, Salas was an outstanding citizen and widely-respected broker in Bakersfield before he shot and killed his friend and business partner, who was having an affair with Salas’s wife. He voluntarily surrendered to authorities immediately after the shooting. After his conviction, Salas was incarcerated for about three years, then released on probation.

A news report published March 24, 1977 in The Bakersfield Californian says Salas shot his partner, Richard Hillman, in a motel parking lot in 1972. Hillman was shot once in the abdomen, once in the leg and three times in the back.


The bureau issued Salas a restricted license in 1980, then granted an unrestricted license in 2005, records showed. He has had no disciplinary issues since he obtained his restricted license.

Historic headline (Bakersfield Californian )

morgan.cook@sduniontribune.com