Irvine’s Baker Charged With Check Forgery

Former Irvine City Councilman C. David Baker was charged Wednesday with forging the signature of an Orange County Superior Court judge on a $48,000 check written on the account of a local nonprofit foundation that Baker headed at the time.

Baker is charged with writing the check to himself on June 2, during the final days of his unsuccessful bid for the Republican nomination in the 40th Congressional District, and signing it with Judge David G. Sills’ name as well as his own. The foundation’s check required two signatures, and Sills was chairman of the organization.

Baker’s campaign was reportedly desperately short of cash at the time.

10-Week Investigation

The single felony count was filed by the county district attorney’s office after a 10-week investigation. If convicted, Baker, 35, could be sentenced to up to three years in prison.

At the request of his attorney, Paul S. Meyer, Baker’s arraignment was delayed to Sept. 23.

Baker, looking rested and relaxed, appeared briefly Wednesday afternoon before Superior Court Judge Richard W. Stanford Jr. in Santa Ana.

It was his first public appearance since the forgery allegations surfaced, two days after Baker narrowly lost the June 7 Republican primary to C. Christopher Cox.

Dressed in a gray suit, white shirt and bright red tie, the 6-foot, 10-inch Baker towered over his attorney as he stood in the courtroom. As he left the proceeding, Baker declined to answer reporters’ questions. He was later booked at Orange County Jail and released on his own recognizance.

“People who are casual observers of this matter don’t have any sense of the tremendous anguish David Baker has been through,” Meyer said. “He has been stripped of almost everything--his respect, his standing in the community and quite possibly any chance at future consideration as a political candidate.”

In a prepared statement released Wednesday, Baker admitted that he signed Sills’ name on a $48,000 check from the Irvine Health Foundation without Sills’ knowledge and deposited the check in his own account.

Last-Minute Mailers

He did so, the statement said, to verify to his campaign staff that he had adequate funds to cover a series of last-minute political mailers that were considered crucial to his congressional bid.

The statement also said, however, that Baker, executive director of the foundation at the time, placed a stop-payment order on the check within 24 hours and never intended for any money to leave the foundation’s account.

In fact, none of the foundation’s money was ever transferred to the councilman’s personal account, according to the statement.

Thus, Meyer insisted, there had been no “criminal intent” on Baker’s part.

But Deputy Dist. Atty. Christopher John Evans said Baker had benefited from the forged check, because it was used to show that there was money in his account and therefore in effect “covered the bills. There was an intent to defraud--that’s why we filed charges in this case.”

Evans also disputed Meyer’s statement that Baker stopped payment on the check within 24 hours, saying it was 48 to 72 hours before the former councilman stopped the check.

Meyer sought the arraignment delay so a pre-sentence report could be prepared, as is often done in cases in which a defendant may wish to settle before a case goes to trial, Evans said.

When asked about seeking a settlement, Meyer said it is “certainly possible. David Baker wants that. . . . He doesn’t want to put his family through any more.”

But Evans made the district attorney’s office position on the matter clear: “We’re not entering any deals with him.”

Sills, once a political ally of Baker’s, notified the district attorney’s office of the alleged wrongdoing after he and other members of the foundation board confronted Baker about foundation checks that were missing five days before the June primary.

During that meeting, Sills and the others asked for and received Baker’s resignation from the foundation. Baker then broke down emotionally, and several hours later quietly entered Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian in Newport Beach for treatment of depression and exhaustion.

He spent much of the next three days in the hospital, without the knowledge of most of his campaign staff and supporters, before returning home the night before the primary.

In his statement Wednesday, Baker said the decision to forge Sills’ signature came at the end of an “extremely vicious campaign,” when he was suffering from “mental and physical exhaustion.” He said he did it at a time when money for a loan on his house was to come through within hours so that it could be used to replace the unauthorized check.

Baker said he “regrets” his action and realizes that it “may have breached the trust placed in him” by family and friends.

Sills declined comment on the forgery charge, saying it would be inappropriate for a judge to comment on a pending legal matter.

He did say, however, that a subsequent audit of the foundation found no money missing.

The foundation board recently named Robert W. Mitchel, former dean of business at Orange Coast College, to replace Baker as executive director.

John Nakaoka, Baker’s congressional campaign manager, said he is “stunned” and “disappointed” at the decision to file the charge against Baker.

It was the latest in a series of setbacks for Baker, once considered one of the top political prospects in the county’s Republican party. A basketball star at UC Irvine, he enjoyed broad support in Irvine and had the backing of the county’s real estate and development industry, as well as many of its most influential Republican activists.

When he announced his congressional candidacy in January, he was the front-runner in the race to succeed retiring Rep. Robert E. Badham (R-Newport Beach) in the 40th District, which has one of the wealthiest and most Republican constituencies in the nation.

But he ultimately lost to Cox by fewer than 1,200 votes. And the disclosures since the election have sent his life into a tailspin.

Costa Mesa Councilman Peter F. Buffa, a fellow Republican who withdrew from primary in the 40th District to support Baker, said from New York, where he was traveling on business:

“I feel badly for David and his family. I just hope he hasn’t done permanent damage to himself, because winning a congressional seat--in fact winning any elective office--is not worth that high price.”

Baker has reportedly sold his Irvine home. And the law firm where Baker worked confirmed Wednesday that he has resigned.

Robert G. Lane, executive director at the Los Angeles-based firm of Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker, said Baker submitted his resignation Aug. 11. The firm had been conducting its own investigation into Baker’s alleged wrongdoings, but the review was halted when Baker resigned.

Lane, who was also in New York on business Wednesday, said that Baker did not outline why he was leaving the firm and that Baker had not been asked to resign.

“I feel very sorry for Dave and his family,” Lane said. “We had a fine relationship with him, and I’m sorry it had to end this way.”

The California State Bar is not likely to take action against Baker until after the forgery case is resolved, said a Bar spokeswoman, Anne Charles.

“But as a matter of practice, anytime an attorney is charged with a felony, we automatically begin monitoring the case,” she said.

Times staff writer Michael Flagg contributed to this article.