LOS ANGELES - The relationship between Los Angeles County Assessor John Noguez and a tax specialist who helped get him elected is the focus of prosecutors examining allegations that property valuations -- and tax bills --
were lowered for favored clients, it was reported today.

In 2009, Abraham Mosaddegh asked the Assessor's Office to reappraise his
downtown office building, but he initially got no traction -- until Noguez, an assessor's employee at the time who would not be elected until 2010, suggested he hire Ramin Salari to help him negotiate a lower valuation, the Los
Angeles Times reported.

"Sure enough, four months later, it went from about $28 million to about $16 million," Mosaddegh told The Times last week. Mosaddegh's tax bill dropped more than $132,000, records show.

A prosecutor in the District Attorney's public integrity unit is looking at 100-plus properties to see if their assessed values were improperly reduced since Noguez was elected, the newspaper reported.

Salari and Noguez both refused interview requests by The Times.   

Salari's attorney, Mark Werksman, said his client "flatly denies exploiting his relationship with anyone at the assessor's office."

In statement Friday, Noguez said:

"I have never directed a property owner to hire any specific consultant.... It is disappointing to learn that some of these consultants traded on knowing me in getting business for themselves."

Soon after he bought the building in 2007, Mosaddegh said, he was besieged by phone calls and visits from Salari, who told him he had contacts in the assessor's office and could get the value reduced. Some two years later,
Mosaddegh hired Salari, who wanted half of whatever tax savings he might win.

A few months after getting Mosaddegh a refund based on the reassessment,
Noguez began his campaign for assessor, whose office is responsible for putting price tags on about $1 trillion of property -- the biggest county property tax roll in the nation.

Soon after that, Mosaddegh said Salari stopped by his office and asked for $2,000 for Noguez's campaign.

"He said he was asking the same amount from all of his clients," Mosaddegh said. "He certainly wasn't shy."

Noguez suggested Mosaddegh have two employees write separate checks for
$1,000 each to make the money trail less conspicuous.

Salari and his wife each gave Noguez's campaign the limit of $2,000, The Times reported.

The district attorney's investigation at the assessor's office was first reported by the Los Cerritos News, a community newspaper headquartered in Cerritos.