Grand Jury Seeks Lawyer to Aid in Jailhouse Informant Inquiry

The Los Angeles County Grand Jury said Wednesday that it wants to investigate the use of jailhouse informants in criminal cases but needs a lawyer to help it.

The announcement came in response to requests for a grand jury investigation by defense lawyer organizations and by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office.

Calls for an investigation have come in response to a demonstration by longtime jailhouse informant Leslie White that he could gather enough information through various ruses to fabricate the murder confession of a defendant he had never met.

In a one-paragraph news release, grand jury foreman Robert D. Leland said the panel “requested the California attorney general to act as legal adviser or to appoint special counsel and special investigators to assist the grand jury in the investigation of the use of inmate informant witnesses who have testified in criminal cases.”

Leland, whose office said he was not available for comment and who did not return a phone call to his home, said in the release that the request had been made Jan. 17.

The release did not mention any response from the attorney general’s office.

Declines to Tell Response

Chief Assistant Atty. Gen. Steve White said his office mailed the grand jury a response Feb. 2 but, citing grand jury secrecy requirements, he declined to say what it was.

A well-informed official, however, said the attorney general’s office declined to provide a lawyer to advise the grand jury.

“It’s a local issue unless nobody locally can handle it,” said the official, who spoke on condition that he not be identified. “Here you have the D.A. out of the matter (because of a conflict of interest), but the county counsel isn’t out of it.”

The official said the attorney general’s office has advised the grand jury to ask the county counsel for a lawyer.

Chief Assistant County Counsel Gerald Crump said his office has not been approached by the grand jury.

“I’ve known that we might be approached,” he said, “but we haven’t made any decisions one way or the other (on whether to provide the grand jury with a lawyer).”

The defense lawyer groups--California Attorneys for Criminal Justice and the Los Angeles Criminal Courts Bar Assn.--requested a grand jury investigation Dec. 16 into what they described as a jailhouse informant scandal that is “threatening to undermine public confidence in our system of justice” in Los Angeles County.

The groups cited an obscure state law that allows the grand jury to ask the presiding judge to appoint special legal counsel for the grand jury in certain unspecified circumstances.

Legal Issue

Before the judge can act on such a request, the law states, he must determine that a conflict of interest exists that would bar the district attorney, the county counsel and the state attorney general from conducting the investigation that the grand jury wants to undertake.

The district attorney’s office joined the defense attorney groups in calling for a grand jury investigation last month.

Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Gregory Thompson said Wednesday: “Whoever is the counsel on this thing--whether it is the attorney general, the county counsel, or someone who is appointed--it is important for the grand jury to conduct a review” to maintain “public confidence in the justice system.”