Chantilly's James Robert "Bob" McClendon Jr. is already in a heap of trouble in Loudoun County. Now, he has to answer to Fairfax County's legal system, as well.
IN MARCH, a Loudoun County grand jury indicted McClendon, 49, of the Sutton Oaks community, for 10 financial crimes. And on June 13, in connection with those same offenses — for which he's scheduled to go on trial in Leesburg in September — Fairfax County police arrested him on four charges of their own.
Police here charged him with two counts of embezzlement and two counts of fraudulent accounting, and he has a July court date for these new charges.
McClendon formerly worked for a Fairfax County company and was responsible for soliciting investors for various projects. One of them was a field house that would have been built in a public/private partnership agreement with the Fairfax County Park Authority and located next to the Cub Run Rec Center.
The field house was to contain facilities for a variety of sports — including indoor track and field — plus large-scale events such as conventions and graduations. But by summer 2004, things had gone awry and the partnership agreement was dissolved.
According to the Loudoun Sheriff's Office, while soliciting investors, McClendon was accused of allegedly "forging other shareholders' names to obtain the money under false pretenses for his own purposes." Authorities said he reportedly forged signatures on three, separate promissory notes to receive money from a Loudoun business and allegedly received a loan for a quarter of a million dollars, as a result.
AN INVESTIGATION ensued and, on Oct. 5, 2004, the Loudoun County Sheriff's Office charged McClendon with seven counts of forgery and uttering (passing a phony document as valid), three counts of obtaining money by false pretenses and one count of money laundering.
McClendon reportedly received the money from a Centreville man. But it's a Loudoun case because he allegedly gave this man a promissory note, signed by himself and others guaranteeing his repayment, on the premises of the man's Loudoun County business.
However, it's also a Fairfax case because McClendon was once the president of Landmark Sports and Entertainment of Clifton which — along with D.W. Sivers of Portland, Ore., — had formed an entity known as West County Field House LLC. And it was this entity that, in December 2003, had signed a 30-year lease agreement with the Fairfax County Park Authority to develop and run the field house.
McClendon's slated to stand trial, Sept. 14, in Loudoun County Circuit Court. But first, he has a July 13 date in Fairfax County's General District Court. Following his June 13 arrest in this county, McClendon was released from the Adult Detention Center on a total of $6,000 bond — $1,500 for each of his four criminal charges.