Hearing Continues in Work-Furlough Case : Private Jail Operator Wants New Judge

A private jail operator locked up late last month by an angry judge wants a cooler head to prevail in continuing hearings on allegations that he misled the court about his ties to a work-furlough program.

The attorney for Glen Cornist, who is accused of hoodwinking South Bay Municipal Court Presiding Judge Thomas Gligorea into placing him in a work-furlough program he founded, asked Gligorea on Monday to disqualify himself from the case.

Gligorea last week revoked Cornist’s probation on a drunk-driving conviction and ordered him to serve a 120-day term at County Jail.

In August, the judge had agreed to let Cornist serve the time at California Halfway Houses Inc., a downtown San Diego work-furlough center. But Cornist’s estranged wife subsequently told Gligorea that Cornist was the owner and operator of the center, and the judge ordered Cornist jailed.

“I think a fraud was perpetrated on me,” Gligorea complained at last week’s hearing, ordering prosecutors to continue their investigation of the incident.

On Monday, however, attorney Curtis Cheney, whom Cornist had just hired to replace his previous lawyer, told Gligorea that, under California case law, it is grounds for disqualification when a judge questions the veracity of a criminal defendant.

In a written statement, Cornist also objected that Gligorea had met outside of court with his wife, Barbara Cornist, on the matter and had stated in court last week that Cornist could expect a sentence of nearly a year if the allegations of his ties to the center could be corroborated.

Gligorea refused to disqualify himself from the case, saying his comment about a “fraud” was not directed at Cornist. He also refused Cheney’s request for a delay of Monday’s hearing, at which further evidence was offered of Cornist’s ties to the work-furlough center.

Cheney said he would appeal both decisions.

“We’ve got to do something to try to get a judge who’s not so close to the case on it,” he said.

During the hearing, one witness testified that Cornist undertook business on behalf of California Halfway Houses at a time when he was supposed to be an inmate of the center. Another witness said Cornist had offered him a job at the center and appeared to be running it a month before Cornist asked Gligorea for placement there.

Richard P.M. Bowden II, president of California Halfway Houses, testified that he had assumed control of the work-furlough center from Cornist in the spring. Bowden said he first learned that Cornist had not filed documents making the transfer official when he read an article in The Times last week that reported that Cornist was the company’s registered agent.

Bowden acknowledged that he had worked for another of Cornist’s private jail programs and lived at Cornist’s house earlier this year, including the date of his arrest on a concealed weapons charge. But under questioning by Gligorea, Bowden said Cornist’s role as a “special consultant” to California Halfway Houses had terminated at least a month before he was placed at the center as an inmate.

Bowden also acknowledged writing a letter to Cornist’s former attorney, Alfred Greene, accepting Cornist into the program--a letter Gligorea has labeled misleading. But Bowden insisted that he did not intend for the letter to be submitted to the court.

California Halfway House records provided to the court by Bowden indicated that Cornist was at the work-furlough center on the evening of Sept. 9. But Alan Bell, chairman of the Jamul-Dulzura Community Planning Group, testified that Cornist made a presentation to the group in Jamul that night, on behalf of a plan by California Halfway Houses to establish a center in the area.

Gligorea scheduled a hearing later this month for Cornist to rebut Monday’s testimony.