‘I don’t want to make any waves. I made enough of them.’

These days, say several attorneys who still have business with Edward Higgins Sr., the first man jailed for defying the Coastal Zone Conservation Act lives in a factory-built house, in western Malibu near the Ventura County line.

It is an ordinary-looking building in a spectacular location, on the beach side of Pacific Coast Highway.

It is also one of 12 units--seven homes and five guest houses--that Higgins ordered and installed in three Malibu neighborhoods in 1973. The state argued that Higgins needed to get coastal permits under the new law, the result of a shoreline protection measure overwhelmingly passed by the voters in 1972.

When Higgins continued work on some of the buildings despite a temporary restraining order, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge held him in contempt and sentenced him to five days in the Los Angeles County Jail, starting March 4, 1974.

“It was a big deal, getting involved in implementing a major new piece of legislation, “ recalled Jeffrey Freedman, who was the deputy attorney general handling the Higgins case.

“I don’t drive through Malibu without thinking about it,” said Freedman, now a West Los Angeles labor lawyer. “That was the heyday of environmental concerns.”

Over the years, at least one other person--a Mendocino County woman--also has gone to jail for contempt in a coastal case.

And Higgins has kept fighting to develop his lots ever since, a battle that has kept him in and out of court.

More than once, he sold land or an interest in it, and then got back the land, along with the coastal permits the new owners had obtained.

The Coastal Commission sued him again. So did investors in two transactions, who claimed that Higgins wrongfully foreclosed on property.

Higgins doesn’t want to talk much about his trials. “I don’t think it would be in my best interest,” he said when reached by telephone. “I don’t want to make any waves. I made enough of them.”

In 1986, court records show, Higgins agreed to pay a $500 fine and remove truckloads of fill that he had placed in a ravine in Latigo Canyon. The Coastal Commission contended that the material violated conditions of a coastal permit issued to Arthur L. James, who bought the property from Higgins in 1977. Higgins had reacquired the land in 1980.

Two months ago, the state Court of Appeal upheld a judgment of more than $1 million against Higgins in a lawsuit brought by an attorney, an engineer and a marketing consultant. The three partners, Alan Fenster, Anthony Russomano and Philip Werber, bought an interest in seven lots between the coast highway and the ocean. They got coastal permits to build two houses before Higgins foreclosed.

The three had tried to sell their interest in the land, but the sale fell through because the title was not clear. The trial court judge called Higgins’ actions “intentionally malicious.”

“We’re taking that to the Supreme Court,” Higgins said. His lawyer, William A. Kerr, said he will attempt to reduce the amount of the award. Meanwhile, Higgins has deposited $1.5 million in cash, proceeds from the sale of his former home on Sea Level Drive, with the Superior Court.

Higgins also continues to deal with another, similar lawsuit. He is working to fulfill terms of a settlement in which Higgins is to provide a clear title, and the buyer, Neland Sprik, is to apply for more coastal permits for yet more lots. Higgins and Sprik are dividing several properties between them which they will develop separately.