A former manager of Juneau’s Switzer Village Mobile Home Park allegedly embezzled funds, failed to pay back millions in loans and sold property she didn’t own. That’s according to a lawsuit her mother, the majority owner of Switzer Village, filed earlier this month.
Marlene Schneider of S&S Development, LLC, is suing her daughter, Josette Duran, accusing her of using the mobile home park in Lemon Creek as “a source of money, labor, materials, and assets for Duran Construction and for members of her family,” according to the complaint.
Josette’s husband, Marciano Duran, and their company, Duran Construction, are also named as defendants. The Juneau business does general contracting and real estate development. In an email to KTOO, the Durans denied wrongdoing.
“The allegations are disputed and remain subject to litigation,” the Durans said in the email.
According to the couple, the construction company has been a contractor for the mobile home park since the 1980s.
Josette began managing Switzer Village in 2011, after her mother’s husband, Charlie Schneider, died. Josette was fired in June this year due to her “lack of transparency,” according to the lawsuit.
According to the complaint, the Durans borrowed millions of dollars from the Schneiders, starting in the 1990s.
“The Durans repaid some of the earlier, secured loans but, after Charlie’s death in 2011, borrowed increasingly larger sums without security and largely stopped repaying,” Schneider alleges in the complaint. “More than $7 million remains unpaid.”
She claims Josette also paid Duran Construction for work that wasn’t completed, paid herself more than her manager position was allotted, and wrote hundreds of thousands of dollars in checks to Duran Construction — many of which did not specify the reason for payment.
Schneider also alleges that Josette sold three mobile home units to Duran Construction without permission or payment, and used park funds to buy a mobile home for her son that she didn’t pay rent on.
Neither Schneider nor her attorney responded to a request for comment.
