County Official Says Wisely Suit Against Gates Is Dismissed

A $110-million lawsuit charging Orange County Sheriff Brad Gates and 24 deputies with harassing and psychologically torturing convicted killer Willie Ray Wisely and his wife has been dismissed by a federal judge, a county official said Thursday.

Edward N. Duran, deputy county counsel, said his office had been told by U.S. District Court Judge William Gray’s court clerk in Los Angeles that the lawsuit had been dismissed, apparently because of questions about the authenticity of signatures on the complaint.

Although his office has yet to receive the formal order of dismissal, Duran said it was his understanding that the suit was thrown out of court after Sheila A. Williams, a Laguna Beach lawyer listed on the complaint as Wisely’s attorney, told the court that she had nothing to do with filing the lawsuit and in fact was no longer representing Wisely.

In Jail for 6 Years

Williams’ signature appeared three times in the lawsuit, but she told court officers that she had never signed the papers, Duran said.

“She told us she didn’t prepare, review or even see the suit,” Duran said. “We don’t know whose signature it really is.”

Williams was in New York on Thursday and could not be reached for comment.

Wisely, 34, has been in the Orange County Jail for more than six years--longer than any other inmate--and has become something of a local legend because of his ability to use the legal system to his benefit.

He was convicted in 1982 of murdering his stepfather, Robert Bray, and was sentenced to death.

The sentence was later overturned. Wisely has been awaiting new sentencing for the last four years, during which he has delayed the sentencing many times with legal maneuvers.

In the recently dismissed lawsuit, Wisely and Gail Harrington, his wife, who is also his law clerk, said they were victims of a daily harassment campaign that included physical threats, strip searches, intimidation and psychological torture.

Harrington, whom Wisely married in a secret ceremony on Christmas Eve, said the harassment has caused her “extreme emotional stress and trauma” that has resulted in weight loss, diminished memory and chronic nail-biting. As a result, the suit said that Harrington, a third-year law student, was forced to undergo psychological counseling.

Wisely said in the suit that he was subjected to a campaign of “bitter harassment,” which had rendered him “listless, extremely depressed, frustrated, uncertain and angry.”

Wisely said deputies routinely and maliciously regulated the temperature in his jail cell to 90 degrees one day and under 50 degrees the next, “laughing about it, as they called out derisively, ‘Hope it’s not too hot in there for you, inmate Wisely!’ ”

On other occasions, the lawsuit said, deputies intentionally cut the power to his cell, causing his personal computer to “crash,” damaging his computer discs and impairing his ability to work on his own defense.

Wisely also said that seven jail deputies subjected him to embarrassment and ridicule by conducting tours of grand jurors, high school students, college students and other people by his private cell when he was “showering, sitting on the toilet or lying in bed.”

The deputies, the suit continued, also tried to annoy Wisely by serenading his cell with the singsong poem, “Little Willie, Willie won’t go home, cause he’s a murdering scumbag, oh no.”

Wisely further asked the court to order the deputies to stop calling him “Willard, Wilburt or Wilbur,” and to refer to him only as “Willie Wisely” or “Mr. Wisely.”