FYI: The Berlin Wall fell on Nov. 9, 1989.

A battle with millions at stake has broken out on the old Cambria Air Force Base (and, yes, there really is such a thing)

BY DANIEL BLACKBURN

Against a backdrop of the Hawaiian flag fluttering in the foggy ocean breeze and the skeletal remains of the Cambria Air Force Base, Richard Figueroa glowered across a painted red line at a man he thought was interfering with destiny.

Brian Davis glared back and muttered, "What's his problem?"

The two men stayed at least 10 feet apart, as specified in a court order signed in April by San Luis Obispo County Superior Court Judge Donald Umhofer. The red line had been spray-painted by sheriff's deputies to mark the limits of Figueroa's access to the old military facility he and his family have occupied for the past three years.

There, on the site of what once was a sophisticated and secret Cold War radar surveillance base, Figueroa and Davis are waging a quirky but bitter battle of wills with potential millions of dollars at stake. And don't forget the very security of the nation, adds Figueroa.

Established in the late 1940s, the Cambria Air force Base was a runway-bereft facility, the temporary home for 300 airmen and support personnel scanning the skies with state-of-the-art technology for signs of Soviet nuclear attack. The base was shuttered in 1974 after radar-equipped flying fortresses rendered many land installations obsolete. The base has sat idle ever since, a fading Cold War relic perched atop a spectacular bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

What had been a partnership with grandiose plans of linking China and Cambria by way of fiber optic cable has deteriorated into a banal conflict of name-calling and mutual harassment. Law enforcement officials who have been beating a steady path to the air base are shaking their heads, bemused.

And a lawyer for one of the parties, San Luis Obispo's James McKiernan, compared the drama to "a bad Shakespeare play with too many King Richards." McKiernan wondered, "How can you stop the fighting between the Hatfields and McCoys?"

When the dust eventually settles, it may turn out that the cards were stacked against Figueroa, a stocky, full-blooded Hawaii native whose development plans for the abandoned air base property have been the buzz of Cambria since his arrival in April 2000.

Figueroa and his then-partner, George "Buck" Vaile, hoped to raise sufficient capital to hard-wire China to U.S. shores. The former Air Force base is the locale of one of a very few authorized cable landings on the West Coast, and the partners hoped to exploit warming relations between this country's government and the Chinese.

As part of the deal, Figueroa set up shop at the base, occupied one of the old officers' quarters, and began the process of capitalization of the company.

With initial funding from Figueroa, Vaile, and a group of local investors, Golden Thread Landing LLC and its new CEO, Figueroa, began its high-tech quest for the technological brass ring. According to Figueroa, he owned 68 percent of the company, with the balance divided among Vaile and future investors.

George Vaile made his money in the entertainment business. He founded a company called Manex Entertainment, the special effects house that won an Academy Award for its work on science-fiction film thriller "The Matrix." He recently was awarded $4 million in a lawsuit against the firm to which he had sold Manex.

For his part, Figueroa covered ground like a gazelle, bouncing from Coastal Commission meetings to SLO County Supervisors' offices, hosting guests from the Department of Defense and other federal agencies, private corporations like Raytheon Inc., and Global Crossings Inc., the world's largest subterranean cable-laying company.

His frenetic activity did not escape notice by the Cambria community, so to quell rumors that "the Hawaiian Mafia" had expropriated the Air Force base, Figueroa invited the Cambria Chamber of Commerce to lunch with him in the officers' club. A buffet greeted guests, an ample spread covering the weathered oak bar where military reconnaissance wizards once imbibed.

The falling out started in October 2000, Figueroa said, when he and Vaile were meeting in Las Vegas with prospective investors from Beijing. Whatever the circumstances, Figueroa, without realizing it, returned from that trip occupying an entirely different position with Golden Thread Landing LLC and partner Vaile.

Figueroa said he subsequently received an e-mail from a friend which suggested George Vaile was being investigated by law enforcement authorities in Ohio, in connection with a failed marketing scheme.

"I called him and asked, 'George, what's this all about?' and he was very evasive," said Figueroa.

At this point, Figueroa retained SLO attorney John Belcher to summarize the agreement alleged to exist between Vaile and Figueroa.

Vaile's response was to notify Belcher that he would sell his interest in the air base property for $3 million if Vaile could retain 10 percent of future fiber optic cable profits. At the time, Vaile was managing director of Golden Thread Landing LLC, and was responsible for making the $5,000 monthly mortgage payment on the air base property, which the partnership had purchased for $1.7 million.

"I had no problem with Vaile's 10 percent share," said Figueroa. But then Vaile tried to sweeten his deal, and Figueroa said he balked. Subpoenas began to fly back and forth. Figueroa said he struggled to find a way to keep the cable dream alive, dreams that took a hit in November 2001 when the company filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Two months later, Figueroa said he was watching pro football playoffs on television when "the invasion," as he likes to call it, occurred.

"It was January 12, 3:13 in the afternoon when the devil from hell shows up," Figueroa said, relating how a truck full of people broke a padlock on a gate and drove up the winding, narrow asphalt strip that serves as a road to the old air base.

Figueroa said one of the new arrivals told him, "I'm the debtor in possession, and I took over this property." The man was Brian Davis, treasurer of Apollo International Construction Co. of Los Angeles.

Apollo International, Davis explained to sheriff's deputies who arrived shortly thereafter, was the company he represented and which had entered into a contract with Vaile to purchase the property.

Davis and a handful of associates commandeered several of the decrepit buildings and, by Figueroa's assessment, "started camping out."

Figueroa dug in his heels and the combatants began a war of attrition.

"Their intention in coming onto the property," Figueroa said of Davis and his group, "was to harass, intimidate, to get me out of here."

Davis' men and Figueroa's family traded barbs while their respective lawyers planned battle attacks.

Davis' business partner in Los Angeles, Richard Reed, hoped to finalize a deal with Vaile to lease, with a purchase option, the land and the assets of Golden Thread Landing LLC. Reed retained Jim McKiernan, who promptly sought to disqualify Figueroa's counsel, Belcher, on a conflict of interest issue. Belcher recently bowed out of the proceedings.

Suddenly lawyer-less, Figueroa faced the full-court press of McKiernan, who sought for his client, Apollo International, a "judgment of ejection," an uncommon legal maneuver much different from ordinary eviction.

In one courtroom incident, Judge Umeofer advised the rival factions "to get it together, or you'll all be off that hill," recalled McKiernan.

Deciding that Vaile had a superior claim to the property, Umhofer issued a restraining order on June 19 requiring Figueroa and his family to confine their movements to an area extending just a few feet from the small base house they occupied.

The order also forbids verbal communication between the parties, specifies that both will have keys and combinations to gate locks at the property's entrance, that both will stay at least 10 yards from one another, and that both agree not to stalk or spy on the other.

On July 19, Umhofer ruled in favor of Apollo International Construction, and sheriff's deputies were told to evict Figueroa's family. Only Figueroa himself will be allowed to stay under provisions of the Umhofer decision, until questions pending before the court are settled.

As of last Friday, though, not much had changed on the hill, except that Reed and Davis have cut off the electricity and phone service to Figueroa's bungalow. That's why Figueroa barbecues lunch over hot coals as he relates his story to a reporter.

"I'm all about keeping the peace here," Brian Davis said, settling in at a table in what once was the air base's mess hall.

Davis is treasurer and on-site representative for Apollo International Construction Inc., and he has taken up temporary residency in the mess hall with his fiancée, Jessica Bornemann.

Davis is a slight man, with short-cropped, receding blond hair who wears a look of deep resignation as he talks. Interviews with the media, he said, are not high on his list of fun things to do.

"We do not have anything to hide," he said, adding that his company has agreed to manage the property and restore the base's infrastructure and long-neglected self-sustaining utilities.

"It's sad that we are not getting along," said Davis of Figueroa. "Over the years he's been here, he’s gathered a lot of information about the base that would be very helpful. He has charm, he has big visions. If we were working together it would be great. But we are not."

And Davis ascribes little chance to the possibility of eventual cooperation. "I'm not saying that because I have anything against him," said Davis.

The Apollo group is interested in buying the property, said Davis.

But for what purpose?

"I hesitate to answer that question because it has been an issue for our partnership, how much do we want to put out there publicly about what we are doing," Davis said. "Now Mr. Figueroa, he's very open. He won't stop telling people what he's doing. So we are forced to answer that question."

Davis then said, "It would be so much better for us if this could be a private real estate transaction. That way, we could let people know what we want to do, when we want them to know–you know what I mean?"

The situation is "awkward," he added, because he doesn't want it thought that "we're going to bring in the UFOs, or that we have some covert plan. It's just that this situation has been uncomfortable for us."

Davis took a deep breath.

"This is not the way we would have chosen to publicize ... but you're here, aren't you?" he asked a reporter.

Figueroa, said Davis, has "created a situation that has brought media attention. So the smart thing to do is to be out front, and see where that gets us.

"We see this property as a kind of retreat and digital-film-and-video studio, and the location of an institute where conferences can be held to bring people together. We have no interest in any kind of homeland security or anything like that," he said.

One of Figueroa's current plans, despite his legal problems, is to use the land for a private, high-tech security base which could enter into lucrative contracts with military entities.

"I think Mr. Figueroa believes something has been taken away from him," said Davis. "That's the best way I can describe it."

Lawyer McKiernan, relishing a courtroom bout with a man serving as his own attorney, said he plans to ask Judge Umhofer to bring tranquility to the air base through a unique mechanism called "swearing the peace."

Under a California statute enacted in 1892, any individual can claim to a judge a "disruption of the peace." If a judge agrees that there exists "any threat to the peace," the result would be a court order to the parties to "keep the peace." The penalty for ignoring the order was a fine set at $5,000–a fortune back in 1892–or a prison sentence.

"That would stop the feuding that's going on up there," McKiernan said. "It's a novel approach that really fits the situation, I think."

Today, the air base property is in foreclosure and the stage is set for a trial between Figueroa and Davis' group in November before Judge Umhofer. Æ

New Times news editor Daniel Blackburn can be reached at [email protected]