The Nation - News from May 8, 1988

A Superior Court judge in Phoenix refused a two-week delay of former Gov. Evan Mecham’s May 19 trial on charges of concealing a $350,000 campaign loan. Defense attorney Michael Scott had asked Judge Michael D. Ryan for the delay to give him more time to prepare and to allow an appeals court to rule on a bid for a dismissal of the charges on grounds of selective prosecution. Scott has argued that Gov. Rose Mofford and former School Supt. Carolyn Warner, Mecham’s 1986 Democratic opponent, had made similar omissions in disclosure statements. Assistant Atty. Gen. Barnett Lotstein said both are under investigation. In an impeachment trial last month, the Senate convicted Mecham, 63, of misusing $80,000 and trying to thwart a death threat probe.