Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Page 7
PERSPECTIVES (Column)
Two Would-Be Judges—Kim and Felder—Try to Get by With Bogus Ballot Designations
By ROGER M. GRACE
It’s happening again. This election year, as in the past, candidates for the Los Angeles Superior Court are seeking to buoy their chances at the polls by claiming ballot designations that make them seem to be something more than they are.
Through their deception, they are making clear what they’re not: fit to serve as jurists.
Two such candidates are spotlighted here today.
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ACH CANDIDATE may have a description under his or her name on the ballot. With respect to non-office-holders, Elections Code §13107(a)(3) permits “[n]o more than three words designating either the current principal professions, vocations, or occupations of the candidate, or the principal professions, vocations, or occupations of the candidate during the calendar year immediately preceding the filing of nomination documents.”
In the past, full-time lawyers who teach one or two nights a week at a law school sought to list “professor” or “law professor” as a “principal occupation,” in some instances succeeding when a writ proceeding was brought challenging the designation, and in some instances not. There was also inconsistency among judges as to whether the holder of the title “adjunct professor” may drop the word “adjunct,” thus implying a full professorship. These issues have apparently died without definitive appellate court resolution because candidates have come to realize that “professor” is not all that an effective designation.
The most positive image—next to that of a sitting judge—now appears to be that of a criminal prosecutor…and the more despicable the sort of miscreant the prosecutor is portrayed as pursuing, the stronger the designation.
This year, we have a candidate mendaciously proclaiming herself to be a “Violent Crimes Prosecutor” when she conducts no prosecutions; also, there’s a lawyer posing as a “Deputy City Prosecutor” when he holds no such position and never has.
Two other candidates are implying that they are judges; they aren’t now, but previously did serve as administrative law judges. Whether they do have entitlement to the designations they want to use will be looked at tomorrow.
•Helen Kim, a part-time deputy district attorney who works in the intake section, is the lawyer who claims to be a “Violent Crimes Prosecutor.” Basically, she has a three-day-a-week desk job.
Making a determination as to whether charges should be filed against a particular individual is, of course, a function of a prosecutorial office, and some of those whom Kim determines should be charged are perpetrators of violent crimes. Yet, to say that she is a “prosecutor” of violent criminals strikes me as so much of a stretch as to amount to a lie.
This is reminiscent of the misrepresentation two years ago by Deputy District Attorney Craig Gold who pretended to be a “Criminal Trial Prosecutor.” Hogwash. He did (and does) handle civil assets forfeitures. He confiscates goods from the bad guys; he doesn’t prosecute them for their crimes.
Kim is a client of political consultant Fred Huebscher, a master of campaign deception.
Her opponent in the race for Office No. 76 is Alison Matsumoto Estrada, a fulltime deputy district attorney. A member of the Public Integrity Unit, Matsumoto Estrada is billed as a “Government Corruption Prosecutor.”
•B. Otis Felder, a maritime and admiralty attorney, is the supposed “deputy” city prosecutor. Felder, admitted to practice in 1995, recently participated in the Los Angeles City Attorney’s Office “Volunteer Attorney Training Program.” That program is aimed at new admittees, providing them with actual trial experience, with no remuneration other than the experience, coupled with some MCLE credits.
The City of Los Angeles—unlike Long Beach, Pasadena, Redondo Beach and certain other cities in California—does not have a “City Prosecutor,” and no one in the City of L.A. holds the job title of “Deputy City Prosecutor.” Nonetheless, it would doubtlessly be unobjectionable if a deputy in the Office of Los Angeles City Attorney, who handles prosecutions, referred to himself or herself, generically, as a “Deputy City Prosecutor.” Indeed, two years ago, when then-Los Angeles City Attorney Carmen Trutanich was running for district attorney, a judge ruled that while he could not use the designation “Los Angeles Chief Prosecutor”—implying incumbency in the county office—he could use the words, “Los Angeles City Prosecutor.” (That’s four words, but under the Elections Code, a geographical entity constitutes a single word.)
A problem with Felder saying that he is a “Deputy City Prosecutor” is that he is not (and never has been), a “deputy” in any prosecutorial office. His chosen ballot designation implies, untruthfully, that he is.
Trutanich, in 2009, initiated the program in which Felder enrolled, referring to a participant as a “reserve deputy city attorney,” mimicking a term accorded volunteer peace officers—such as “reserve sheriff’s deputies—who serve occasionally in patrol cars. Trutanich had no authority to confer that designation, and it is no longer employed.
Put aside for a moment the question of whether past jobs may be utilized in ballot designations. Forget that only three words are allowed (except for certain office-holders). What if Felder called himself a “Reserve Deputy City Attorney”? The legitimacy of that description would be debatable.
However, absent use of the word “reserve,” or any such qualification (such as “volunteer” or “auxiliary”), the deceptiveness is patent. The position held by a participant in the “Volunteer Attorney Training Program” is not that of a “deputy city attorney”—a salaried position, with benefits and rights and high hiring standards—but is one categorized by the city as that of an “extern.”
For Felder to convey the impression that he is a deputy city attorney when, in truth, he has been no more than an extern is grossly dishonest.
Even more egregious is Felder’s fib on LinkedIn. Under his name are the words “Former City Prosecutor,” implying that he has been the prosecutor for a city.
He seems to be taking lessons from Trutanich.
Does it matter that Felder is no longer in the program? If he were now unemployed, it wouldn’t, for ballot designation purposes.
As it happens, Felder is back in private law practice, according to his Link-In posting. Under California Code of Regulations §20710, a prior position, even if held within the preceding calendar year, can’t be invoked in a ballot designation if the candidate has a new job.
That provision will be discussed tomorrow in connection with practicing attorney Pamela Matsumoto’s claim to being an “Administrative Law Judge,” a post she recently held but no longer does.
Felder’s rivals are Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Dayan Mathai, labeled a “Gang Homicide Prosecutor,” and Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner Jacqueline Lewis, whose designation could not conceivably be faulted: “Los Angeles Superior Court Commissioner.” They are vying for Office No. 61.
FOOTNOTE: A person accurately described as a “Deputy City Prosecutor” could be, as noted, either a person who actually holds that job title (as in Long Beach) or a person to whom the generic description would apply—e.g., a prosecutor in the Office of Los Angeles City Attorney. To avoid confusion, it would make sense to put actual job titles in caps and lower case, and generic descriptions in lower case.
For example, there would be reference to “Deputy District Attorney,” utilizing initial caps, but to “gang homicide prosecutor,” with lower case letters.
This would require a statutory change. Elections Code §13107(f) mandates “uppercase and lowercase type” for all designations.
Instead of this, or also, §13107(a)(1) might be broadened. It provides for no word limits for “designating the elective city, county, district, state, or federal office which the candidate holds at the time of filing the nomination documents to which he or she was elected by vote of the people, or to which he or she was appointed, in the case of a superior court judge.”
Fitting job titles of positions that are not elective and not those of Superior Court judges into three words—and maintaining accuracy—is not always easy. This has come up in connection with, for example, “State Bar Court Judge.” Truncating the title creates inexactitude, thwarting the purpose of informing voters of just what the candidate does.
The code provisions are due for an overhaul.
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