Frizzelle’s Grand Jury Bill Advances

The Assembly on Thursday approved legislation requiring county grand juries to submit drafts of their reports to the directors of public agencies that are the subject of jurors’ investigations.

The measure, by Assemblyman Nolan Frizzelle (R-Huntington Beach), was approved on a bipartisan vote of 56 to 13 and sent to the Senate.

The bill was prompted by a longstanding dispute between the Orange County Grand Jury and the county’s Department of Education, which has been the subject of several critical grand jury reports over the past decade.

County education officials complained that many of the jury’s conclusions were inaccurate because the Department of Education did not have a chance to review and comment on the jury’s findings before they were published.

Frizzelle’s bill would apply only to administrative reviews or investigations, not criminal cases. It would require grand juries to submit drafts of their findings to the agency under review. The agency would then have 15 days to submit a response to the jury.

The jury also would be required to submit a copy of its final report to the agency at least five days before it was published.

Opposition to the bill has been light since Frizzelle deleted controversial provisions that would have required the grand juries to also publish the agency’s response to its draft report.

Only one assemblyman--Democrat Byron Sher of Palo Alto--spoke against the bill Thursday. He contended that the added requirements would interfere with the independence of the juries and add to the risk that grand jury findings would be leaked to the public before they are final.

“It’s going to make the work of grand juries even harder than it already is,” Sher said.

But others argued that it is necessary to force grand juries to consider the viewpoints of those they are investigating.

“We’ve had occasions where perfectly good county grand juries have simply defamed honest people because they didn’t know any better and didn’t bother to check the facts,” said Assemblyman Larry Stirling (R-San Diego).