The Los Angeles City Ethics Commission has charged Councilman John Lee with violating government ethics laws stemming from a trip he took to Las Vegas before being elected to the council, the agency said Monday.

The Ethics Commission held a probable cause conference on August 31 and served Lee with a nine-page indictment on September 26. The board must still hold an administrative evidentiary hearing. Members of the commission will determine after the hearing whether the alleged violations occurred and, if so, what punishment should be imposed.

Lee’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The charges stem from Lee’s time as chief of staff to former Councilman Mitchell Englander, who pleaded guilty to federal charges in 2021.

Lee allegedly accepted “multiple gifts from a businessman and a developer, most of which exceeded the city’s gift limit,” during the trip, which played a major role in the case against Englander, in 2016 and 2017 .

The committee also alleges that Lee assisted Englander in an attempt to mislead the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the United States Attorneys Office about whether Englander and Lee were reimbursed for gifts they received during the trip.

Ethics Commission investigators charged Lee with two counts of accepting gifts in excess of the amounts allowed under city law, three counts of failing to properly disclose the gifts he received, four counts of abusing his position and one count of helping another official – Englander, his former boss, abused their position.

Lee left his position as Englander’s chief of staff on June 12, 2017. Nearly two weeks later, he submitted his resignation form, which covered the period from January 1 through June 12, and signed it under penalty of perjury, police said. Complaint from the Ethics Committee. He did not report receiving any gifts during the reporting period, the agency said.