Friday, January 30, 2004
Page 7
END OF THE MONTH: Former Superior Court Judge Schiavelli
Nominated to U.S. District Court...Criminal Defense Lawyer Elizabeth Harris
Elected Superior Court Commissioner...Runoff for Second Commissioner Post Pits Maren Nelson Against John Murphy
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•Judicial Elections
There will be nine judicial contests on
the March 2 primary ballot:
Office No. 18—Deputy District Attorneys Pat Campbell
and Daniel Feldstern, Deputy City Attorney Miguel A. Dager, and Superior Court Referee Mildred Escobedo are
running for the seat being vacated by Judge Marcus Tucker.
Office No. 29— Deputy Attorney General Gus Gomez;
Deputy District Attorneys Jeffrey Gootman, Edward Nison, and Lori Jones; Acton attorney Larry H. Layton, who
operates an unaccredited law school; and Deputy Public Defender C. Edward Mack
are seeking the seat being vacated by Judge Richard Hubbell. Gomez has retained
Parke Skelton as his campaign consultant, while Jones’ campaign is being run by
Huebscher.
Office No. 52—Deputy District Attorneys Larry Diamond
and Laura Priver and Workers’ Compensation Judge John
Gutierrez are running to succeed Judge Nancy Brown, who is retiring
tomorrow. Huebscher
is Priver’s consultant.
Office No. 53—Deputy District Attorneys David Lopez,
Craig Mitchell and Craig Renetzky; Deputy Attorney
General Robert Henry; Torrance attorney Michael Shook; and Superior Court
Referee D. Zeke Zeidler are running for the seat
being vacated by Judge Rosemary Shumsky. Henry has
retained Huebscher as his consultant, while Zeidler is being represented by Cerrell
Associates Inc.
Office No. 67—
Office No. 69—Department of Industrial Relations
attorney P. Michael Erwin, Superior Court Commissioner Donna Groman, Deputy District Attorneys Judith L. Meyer and Carol
Najera, and Sherman Oaks attorney Mitchelll
W. Roth are running to succeed Judge James Wright. Meyer’s consultant is Cerrell Associates; Groman has
retained Evelyn Jerome.
Office No. 72—Judge David Wesley is being challenged
by Deputy District Attorney Daniel Bershin, retired
Deputy District Attorney Herb Lapin, and Los Angeles Police Dept. Sgt. Kevin
Burke, a former Orange County prosecutor. Wesley’s consultant is Cerrell Associates.
Office No. 95—Judge Daniel T. Oki has drawn three
challengers: Deputy District Attorneys Mark Debbaudt
and Hilary Anne Rhonan and Encino attorney Eugene
Salute. Oki has retained Huebscher to serve as
campaign consultant.
Office No. 111—Judge Chesley
McKay is being challenged by Stella Owens-Murrell, an attorney with the
Department of Industrial Relations.
•Judges, Lawyers Under
Scrutiny
Patrick
B. Murphy
Former Los Angeles Superior Court Judge
State Bar Court Judge Robert Talcott has recommended that Murphy, who resigned from the
bench while on the verge of removal in 2001, be disbarred. Murphy did not
petition for review of the recommendation by last month’s deadline.
Talcott recommended in November that Murphy’s
right to practice law be lifted due to the ex-jurist’s “egregious” misconduct
in collecting a judicial paycheck for 120 weeks while on sick leave between
1996 and 2001.
Murphy had asked to enter the
He was also suspended Sept. 16 for
failure to pay his bar dues.
Talcott’s findings largely tracked those of the
Commission on Judicial Performance, which censured Murphy and barred him “from
receiving any assignment, appointment, or reference of work from any
Talcott noted that Murphy was absent from Sept.
20, 1999, until April 3, 2000; stopped working for good as of June 8, 2000; and
resigned on May 4, 2001. He chronicled Murphy’s activities during the time he
was supposedly too sick to work: teaching one or two night law classes a week,
serving as an instructor at a Citizen’s Police Academy in Baldwin Park,
completing pre-med physics and chemistry courses at Cleveland Chiropractic
College in Los Angeles, and attending classes at a school of medicine on the
island of Dominica in the West Indies from January to April of 2000.
Talcott rejected Murphy’s claim that he was
indeed ill, suffering from various maladies including a “phobia” regarding
judicial service. The medical evidence did not support that contention, the
Talcott also found that Murphy lied to Rolf Treu, then the presiding judge of the Citrus court, about
the state of his health
•Judiciary: Vacancies, Appointments
Federal
Courts
Ninth
There are two vacancies on the 28-judge
court.
Republican senators tried in November to
move the nomination of Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Carolyn Kuhl, but a cloture vote failed by 53-43, seven shy of the necessary
60-vote majority.
The Judiciary Committee on May 8 of last
year approved Kuhl, who was rated well-qualified by
at least two-thirds of the ABA Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary, by
a party-line vote of 10-9. Kuhl was tapped by Bush in
2001 to succeed Judge James Browning, who took senior status Sept. 1, 2000.
President Bush on May 15 of last year
nominated William G. Myers III of
Former Los Angeles Superior Court Judge
George Schiavelli was nominated Jan. 20 to succeed
Judge Lourdes G. Baird, who is to take senior status May 12.
Judge Robert J. Timlin
is to take senior status in January 2005, a court official said, although
formal notice has not been given.
State
Courts
There are no vacancies, but one would be
created if the Senate confirms Justice Janice Rogers Brown to the U.S. Court of
Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, to which she was nominated July
25. Brown cleared the Judiciary Committee on a party-line vote of 10-9, but an
attempt to invoke cloture and force an up-or-down vote on her nomination failed
on Nov. 14 by a vote of 53-43, seven short of the required three-fifths
majority.
A majority of the American Bar
Association’s evaluating committee rated Brown “qualified” for the position,
with at least six of the 15 members voting her “not qualified.”
Court
of Appeal
This District (Second District)
Presiding Justice
Charles Vogel of Div.
Four will retire tomorrow.
Third District
Justice
Daniel Kolkey resigned Nov. 17 to return to private
practice.
Seats in other districts are filled.
Judge Nancy Brown is retiring tomorrow,
giving Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger a second vacancy to fill. The earlier opening
occurred when Judge Dale Fischer joined the U.S. District Court for the Central
District of California on Nov. 17.
Judge Alan Haber
is retiring Feb. 9, Judge Margaret Hay March 31, and Judges John Ouderkirk and Lawrence Crispo on
April 5.
Criminal defense attorney H. Elizabeth
Harris was elected a commissioner in balloting that ended this month, and will
be sworn in about a month from now, a court official said. A runoff election is
in progress to fill a second position; the candidates are attorney Maren Nelson and retired Commissioner John Murphy.
The election was necessitated by the Dec.
2 retirement of Commissioner Lonzo Lucas and the Dec.
12 resignation of Richard Novak, who is now in private practice.
•Legislation of
Interest to the Legal Community
The following legislation of interest to
the legal community was acted on in January:
•SCA 1, by Senate President Pro Tem John Burton, D-San
Francisco, which would amend the state Constitution to establish that “the
people have the right of access to information concerning the conduct of the
people’s business,” and could require superior court executive committees to
open their meetings to the public. The proposed amendment was adopted by the
Assembly Jan. 12 and was chaptered by the secretary of state Jan. 15, putting
it before voters on the November ballot.
•SB 246, by Sen. Martha Escutia,
D-Norwalk, which would authorize a superior court to refer delinquent fines,
penalties and restitution to the Franchise Tax Board for collection. The bill
passed the Senate Judiciary Committee on a 6-0 vote Jan. 21, passed the Senate
Appropriations Committee on a 13-0 vote Jan. 22, passed the Senate on a 35-0
vote Jan. 28 and was sent to the Assembly.
•SB 449, by Escutia,
which would provide that when calculating the effective dates of emergency
protective orders, days that are court holidays would
be excluded. The bill also would declare the Legislature’s intent to examine
whether court deadlines should be modified when a court is closed for budgetary
reasons. The bill was amended Jan. 14, passed the Senate Judiciary Committee on
a 5-2 vote Jan. 21, passed the Senate on a 27-7 vote Jan. 26 and was sent to
the Assembly.
•AB 1432, by Assemblyman Marco Firebaugh, D-South
Gate, which would eliminate conviction or acquittal in another country as a bar
to prosecution or indictment in California and as a defense in a trial based
upon the same act or omission. The bill passed the Assembly Appropriations
Committee on a 22-1 vote Jan. 21, passed the Assembly on a 72-2 vote Jan. 26
and was sent to the Senate.
•AB 1704, by the Assembly Judiciary Committee,
which would authorize the filing of a notice of support judgment to be recorded
by a local child support agency or state agency in family law cases. The bill
was amended Jan. 15, passed the Assembly Judiciary Committee on a 13-0 vote
Jan. 20, and was sent to the Assembly floor.
•AB 1709, by the Assembly Judiciary Committee,
which is a spot bill for making changes to the Trial Court Budget Commission.
The bill was amended Jan. 15, passed the Assembly Judiciary Committee on a 13-0
vote Jan. 20 and was sent to the Assembly floor.
•AB 1711, by the Assembly Judiciary Committee,
which would delete obsolete provisions of the State Bar Act. The bill was
amended Jan. 15, passed the Assembly Judiciary Committee on a 13-0 vote Jan. 20
and was sent to the Assembly floor.
•AB 1435, by Assemblyman Paul Koretz,
D-West Hollywood, which would add an award of reasonable attorneys’ fees and
costs to the list of lawful orders which a court is authorized to make upon a
showing that a party in a criminal proceeding has failed to comply with certain
disclosure requirements. The bill was amended Jan. 5 and referred to the
Assembly Public Safety Committee.
Copyright 2004,
Metropolitan News Company