Ruling Limits 3 Ex-McMartin Teachers’ Suits

Three former McMartin Pre-School teachers cannot sue for false arrest, invasion of privacy and slander because their claims were filed too long after their arrests on child molestation charges, a judge ruled Tuesday.

Superior Court Judge Warren Deering’s ruling severely limits two lawsuits for civil damages brought against Los Angeles County and the City of Manhattan Beach by Virginia McMartin, Peggy Ann Buckey and Babette Spitler in the wake of a massive two-year investigation they claim left them distraught and unemployable.

Although the three women can still sue for conspiracy and violation of their civil rights, for which there is no comparable statute of limitations, a state law that took effect last year precludes most of the other claims, Deering ruled.

Attorneys for the teachers said they will appeal the ruling, adding that they believe the heart of their case against the government is intact.

“We’re still left with the meat,” said Spitler’s lawyer, Eliseo D. W. Gauna. Pending claims for conspiracy and civil rights violations “mean the City of Manhattan Beach and the county are still on the hook to our clients,” he said.

“What they have done is they have gone into court and asked for vanilla ice cream,” senior deputy county counsel James M. Owens said, “and the only flavor the court has is chocolate.”

At issue is a state law that requires people suing government agencies to first file claims with the agency within 100 days after alleged harm has occurred. The plaintiffs said they were unaware of a 1984 amendment to the law, which prevents criminal defendants from suing prosecutors while criminal charges are pending and requires them to meet the 100-day deadline for filing claims.

The three women filed their claims in March, within 100 days after criminal charges were dismissed against all but two of the original seven McMartin defendants, Peggy McMartin Buckey and her son, Raymond Buckey.

Deering ruled that initial claims should have been filed within 100 days of their arrest in March, 1984.

“She knew at the time she was arrested that she was innocent--that’s your assertion,” Deering said. “She should have filed her claim within 100 days of that.”

Gauna and James Davis, attorney for McMartin and Buckey, argued that the three women suffered harm throughout the grueling, highly publicized preliminary hearing that preceded dismissal of most of the criminal charges, not just at their arrest, and claimed that the 100-day statute of limitations period should be counted from the date charges were dropped in January, 1986.

“After the largest preliminary hearing ever, anywhere,” Gauna said in his court papers, Spitler “is bankrupt, unemployed, probably unemployable, homeless because her home went for defense costs, and only recently was she able to regain custody of her children. . . . It is clear that innocents were trampled in the rush to judgment.”

Deering declined to rule on whether the McMartin defendants can still sue for malicious prosecution, an action which might more clearly arise from the point at which charges were dismissed.

Gauna and Davis said they will attempt to pursue a malicious prosecution case, but Owens said the county would probably challenge it on late claim grounds.