Real-estate commission disciplines Hills agents

By Dan Daly, Journal Staff Writer | Sunday, August 27, 2006

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PIERRE — The South Dakota Real Estate Commission took disciplinary action against four Black Hills Realtors at its August meeting, according to Dee Jones Noordermeer, the commission’s executive director.

The commission revoked the licenses of two real-estate agents, extended the license suspension of another and put the fourth Realtor on two years of what amounts to real-estate agent probation.

Mel Dreyer, Rapid City, was under a two-month suspension for misrepresentation in a previous property deal. During that time, he was supposed to refrain from all real-estate activities, including advertising himself as a real-estate professional. However, the commission staff found that Dreyer’s picture and phone number remained on the Coldwell Banker Web site as well as his own site. In addition, a sign at an American Legion baseball field in Rapid City had not been taken down.

The commission extended his suspension by a month, to Sept. 1. His previous suspension began June 1 and was to end at the end of July. However, after the new allegations emerged, Dreyer agreed to put his Realtor license on inactive status until the commission’s August meeting, Noordermeer said.

He had originally been suspended for 12 months. The commission ruled that Dreyer had misled investors Doug Hamilton and Courtney Clayborne about the future location of the Wal-Mart Supercenter. Hamilton and Clayborne filed the complaint in March. Noordermeer said the commission dropped 10 months of the suspension on condition that he pays a $2,500 penalty and costs of $20,561.

Dreyer, contacted Friday, said the advertising was accidental and inadvertent. He didn’t realize that the Web sites were still on the Internet. The sign in the baseball park had been overlooked, Dreyer said, because it was in his charity file, not his advertising file.

Ron Bradeen, a Realtor and auctioneer from Custer, faced a complaint for unprofessional conduct relating to misdemeanor convictions for indecent exposure in South Dakota and destruction of property in Wyoming.

The commission revoked his license but suspended the revocation for two years. He has to pay $5,300 in fines and costs and meet a number of requirements for the next two years.

“These were misdemeanors involving moral turpitude, and that is under our jurisdiction,” Noordermeer said. “When the commission learned of these convictions, I filed a formal complaint.” The complaint was heard by a hearing examiner in May, and the case was forwarded to the commission for its August meeting.

Bradeen appeared before the commission with his attorney Neil Fulton of Pierre. Neither Bradeen nor Fulton were available for comment Friday.

In one of the cases, Bradeen was cited for public indecency after an August 2004 incident in which he exposed himself to female staffers at a Box Elder tanning salon. At the time, officials believed he was involved in similar incidents at other tanning salons in the Rapid City area.

Among the conditions: He will lose his license if he is arrested for law violations that are alcohol-related or involve indecent exposure, public urination, sexual acts or nudity. He also must continue with counseling.

During the same commission meeting, Diane Kathryn Bird of Rapid City lost her real-estate license.

The original complaint, filed in April 2005, alleged that she had filed a false application for her Realtor license because she didn’t disclose that the state Division of Insurance had revoked her insurance license. A second charge was later added after Bird was convicted of felony securities fraud in federal court. She served 10 months in a federal prison.

In addition to revoking her license, the commission ordered Bird to pay $3,800 in commission costs.

In the final case, Thomas Costello III of Newell also lost his real-estate license. He was assessed $4,950 in costs as well.

In March, Costello was accused of forging his father’s name and putting an invalid appraiser certificate number on real-estate appraisals that he had done.

The hearing examiner, who heard the case in May, ruled that Costello had indeed “willfully misrepresented that his father had signed off on the appraisal.” The younger Costello was not qualified to conduct appraisals without supervision from a licensed appraiser.

Neither Bird nor Costello were available for comment Friday.

Contact Dan Daly at 394-8421 or dan.daly@rapidcityjournal.com