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Casa de Campo, exclusive Dominican resort, is at the center of Menendez allegations

By Manuel Roig-Franzia,February 06, 2013

View Photo Gallery - : Casa de Campo: A gated paradise: An inside look at the exclusive Dominican…

CASA DE CAMPO, DOMINICAN REPUBLIC — Everyone is someone, it’s said, at Casa de Campo.

And such someones.

Dominican real estate tycoons. Venezuelan oil honchos. Cuban American sugar barons. European heirs and heiresses.

“Her husband was the founder of Monster.com; he died,” Rebecca Hughes, who runs a local Web site, CasadeCampoLiving.com, confides one languid tropical afternoon, gesturing matter-of-factly toward a tall woman strolling across a stone walkway.

In this ultra-exclusive, 7,000-acre redoubt — less gated community and resort than gated alternate planet — discretion is everything.

“You’re able to be here without being harassed,” says Leo Proaño, a Dominican realtor and budding film producer who lives in a golf course villa here. “People say we live in this little bubble . . . but security is very important to us.”

Casa de Campo’s cloistered mystique adds a measure of intrigue to the scandal that’s complicating life for Sen. Robert Menendez, the New Jersey Democrat and newly minted chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Menendez got the VIP treatment, winging down to Casa de Campo a couple of times in 2010 on the private jet of a buddy and campaign contributor, Florida eye doctor Salomon Melgen, who owns a villa here.

Then — whoops — early last month, Menendez forked over $58,500 to cover those flights, because lawmakers aren’t supposed to accept those sorts of freebies. Then — even less conveniently — later in January the FBI raided Melgen’s West Palm Beach office, although it’s not clear what triggered the investigation; a lawyer for Melgen has said law enforcement officials have not clued in his client, either.

Now Menendez is getting questions about his role in pushing for the Dominican Republic to honor a lucrative port security contract awarded to a company with ties to Melgen. Rivals were pretty cranky about the deal since, after all, Melgen is known more as a rich doctor than a security expert.

On top of all that, Menendez has denied allegations that he cavorted with prostitutes, including an underage hooker, during his Casa de Campo jaunts, suggestions that the senator has vigorously denounced as “smears.” (The allegations — made by an anonymous whistleblower and first publicized on a conservative Web site — have not been verified independently.)

Prostitution is legal in the Dominican Republic, though not for underage girls. But “it’s not socially acceptable” in Casa de Campo and is seldom flaunted, says a longtime Dominican resident. The resort’s vibe tilts much more toward decorum — you wouldn’t even go to lunch unless suitably attired — than the anything-goes bacchanalia that defines some Caribbean getaways. Security guards diligently turn away anyone who looks to them like a prostitute. Never mind those occasional, uncomfortable instances when a resident has been mistakenly blocked from entering because she was provocatively dressed, several longtime residents say.

In the scruffy neighboring sugar-mill town of La Romana, prostitutes cluster in strip clubs with private “party” rooms upstairs. On a recent night, a dozen swarmed a visitor to one of those clubs. They preened in skintight skirts so short that they hid almost nothing; they gyrated their hips, clutched their breasts and pouted their lips. “How about me?” “What would you like?” “Let’s have a drink, sweetie.”

The prostitutes talk of occasionally being secreted into Casa de Campo in the back seats of chauffeur-driven SUVs with tinted windows, gliding into the complex past a large, thatched-roof security checkpoint after the swipe of a card opens the gate. A 27-year-old prostitute recalled a four-day job at a Casa de Campo villa for which she collected $500 a night instead of her regular $170. She shed her usual plunging necklines and lacy peek-a-boo tights in favor of more subdued dresses. “I looked very respectable,” she said.

Golf, helipads and polo

Casa de Campo, which lies on the picturesque southeastern coast of the Dominican Republic about 1¹/₂hours from Santo Domingo, began as a getaway for executives of Gulf+ Western. The company operated La Romana’s sugar mill, once the world’s largest.

In the early 1970s, famed golf course designer Pete Dye conjured an 18-hole marvel called the Teeth of the Dog, which has sweeping seaside views and has been named the best course in the Caribbean by Golf magazine. A round can set you back as much as $250, plus tax, though half that much if you’re a resident and well worth it at any price, devotees say. “There’s nothing like it,” says Lou Gilmore, a Pennsylvania businessman who winters at a villa he owns here.

Oscar de la Renta, who once owned a home in Casa de Campo, provided input about the overall “ambience” of the development, according to an official history.