Prosecutors Seeking Firm, Early Date on Preliminary Hearing for Stalker Suspect

In an effort to speed up the case of Night Stalker suspect Richard Ramirez, the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office has requested a court hearing Thursday to pin down a firm date for a preliminary hearing.

“We are going to try and get a definite date--and hopefully it won’t be later than Dec. 13 and possibly earlier,” said Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Gilbert Garcetti. “The pace this case is going now, you’re not going to be into the preliminary hearing until spring, and that’s totally unacceptable.”

Thursday’s hearing will be held before Municipal Judge Candace D. Cooper, who will also preside over the preliminary hearing, in which she must determine whether prosecutors have enough evidence to hold Ramirez for trial.

At Ramirez’s last appearance Oct. 24, Municipal Judge Elva R. Soper had set his next court date for Dec. 13, at which time a date for the preliminary hearing--which could last as long as six months--was to be set.

“We don’t want (his lawyers) to come in Dec. 13 and ask for more time,” Garcetti said. “Let’s get the date set now.”

Ramirez, 25, a drifter originally from El Paso, was arrested in East Los Angeles on Aug. 31, but he did not enter his not-guilty pleas to 14 murder charges and 54 other felonies until Oct. 24. The delays occurred primarily because of substitutions of defense attorneys at Ramirez’s request.

Before hiring his current attorneys, Arturo Hernandez and Daniel Hernandez of San Jose, Ramirez fired two Los Angeles County public defenders appointed to defend him, and later fired Oxnard attorney Joseph Gallegos.

Awaiting Police Reports

While the district attorney’s office is intent on having the hearing begin within a month, defense counsel Arturo Hernandez contended this week that he and his co-counsel, who officially took over the case Oct. 24, will “definitely not” be prepared to begin in December.

Hernandez said he and Daniel Hernandez, who are not related, will not begin working full time on the Ramirez case until “we clear up our other cases in Santa Clara County,” which may be within two weeks. At this point, he said, they are visiting Ramirez on weekends and also communicating by telephone.

Hernandez added that the defense still has not received all police reports, tapes of interviews with witnesses and photos of crime cases pertaining to the Ramirez case.

Garcetti, the No. 2 man in the district attorney’s office, countered that “the truly relevant police records and police reports have been turned over.”

Even if further materials are not received until this week, he added, the defense should be prepared to begin by mid-December. “It’s not that complicated a case,” he said.

Deputy Dist. Atty. P. Philip Halpin, who is prosecuting the case, said he is concerned about delays because “practically speaking, the cases seldom get better with time in that we tend to lose witnesses . . . memories fade and it continues the discomfort for the survivors, particularly those that will be witnesses.”

Already, Halpin said, one witness, Clara Hadsell, 85, a robbery and burglary victim, has died of natural causes.