By Dan Horn
The Cincinnati Enquirer

The search for LaShawn Pettus-Brown took a strange turn Wednesday when federal authorities announced he might be in Los Angeles, trying to land a job with a basketball team.

The Cincinnati native and former college basketball player has been wanted for more than a year in connection with the failed Empire Theater project in Over-the-Rhine.

The city lost more than $184,000 on the project, and the FBI issued an arrest warrant last year for Pettus-Brown, who oversaw the project.

FBI officials in Los Angeles and Cincinnati confirmed Wednesday that they have received information linking Pettus-Brown to the Los Angeles area.

Investigators previously had said they believed Pettus-Brown was still in Greater Cincinnati.

"The bottom line is that we have an indication he is in Los Angeles, has associates here and has indicated he might be interested in playing basketball again," said Laura Bosley, spokesman for the FBI in Los Angeles. "We believe he may be trying out for a team."

She said investigators don't know which team Pettus-Brown is supposed to have spoken to, but they were skeptical of a media report linking him to the Long Beach Jam of the American Basketball Association.

The minor league team would seem to be an odd fit for an FBI fugitive, given that the Jam has received national media attention in recent weeks for signing former NBA star Dennis Rodman.

Team officials vehemently denied the report Wednesday and said they have had no contact with Pettus-Brown, who played college ball for the University of Dayton.

"That's a totally bogus story," said team president Steve Chase. "He has nothing to do with our team."

Pettus-Brown, a former professional basketball player in Japan, accepted thousands of dollars in city loans and grants and then failed to deliver on his promise to fix up the 90-year-old theater on Vine Street.

He has been missing since last January, when allegations of misconduct began to surface.

The Empire Theater fiasco is one of several failed development projects in Cincinnati that have prompted a police investigation into city-funded agencies and others connected to the projects.

The FBI warrant for Pettus-Brown charges him with one count of wire fraud. A search warrant for Pettus-Brown's office later revealed that nearly $93,000 of the money the city paid him is missing.

FBI officials in Cincinnati said they recently received information indicating Pettus-Brown was living in Los Angeles.

"What he was doing out there, we didn't know," said Jim Turgal, spokesman for the FBI in Cincinnati.

Turgal said he sent details about Pettus-Brown to the FBI in Los Angeles and posted a $5,000 reward for tips about his whereabouts. Sometime later, investigators say, they learned of a possible connection to a tryout or attempted tryout with a team in the Los Angeles area.

"We don't have specific information on where he may be playing," Bosley said.

E-mail dhorn@enquirer.com.