Ex-Justice Named Grand Jury Counsel

Retired California Supreme Court Justice Otto M. Kaus on Wednesday was appointed special counsel to the Los Angeles County Grand Jury to direct an investigation into whether local law enforcement officials have misused jailhouse informants.

County Counsel Dewitt Clinton said the county has agreed to pay up to $250,000 for the services of Kaus and other members of his firm and, in addition, will provide Kaus with an investigative staff.

Kaus, who served on the state Supreme Court from 1981 to 1985, said he will head a team of lawyers composed of Warren L. Ettinger and Dan Marmalefsky. All three are partners in the downtown Los Angeles law firm of Hufstedler, Miller, Kaus & Beardsley.

“I’m going to meet my client, the grand jury, tomorrow,” Kaus said Wednesday, “and we’ll give them a vague outline of how to proceed. None of us has ever done this before.”

Kaus added, “We do not consider it our mission to establish in individual cases that one individual prisoner is entitled to a new trial. . . . We are engaged in helping the grand jury in its statutory task of smoking out wrongdoing in the county.”

Kaus, who was appointed by Atty. Gen. John K. Van de Kamp after the grand jury requested a special counsel, said he expects the investigation to take months.