Prentiss Moore, Retired L.A. Judge, Dies

Civic leader and retired Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Prentiss Moore has died from injuries suffered in a June 14 car accident, family members said. He was 79.

The accident took place on his Placerville ranch, where he had lived since retiring in 1976. Moore was trying to park his car when “either the accelerator stuck or he mistakenly stepped on the accelerator instead of the brake,” a family spokesman said. The ensuing car wreck left Moore in a coma from which he did not regain consciousness. He died Saturday.

Moore, son of the late Appeals Court Judge Minor Moore, was active in legal and political circles, and was a confidant of former Gov. Edmund G. (Pat) Brown. Moore was a member of Brown’s “Kitchen Cabinet” of unofficial advisers.

Moore served as counsel on water matters for the attorney general’s office from 1953 to 1958. He represented the state in its dispute with Arizona during those years over redirecting water from the Colorado River for use in Southern California.

He attended Whittier College, USC and Loyola law school. He started practicing law in 1936.

After retiring from his permanent Superior Court post, Moore continued to serve as a “traveling judge” in an arrangement that allows select retired jurists to fill in for vacationing judges and to hear cases during periods of overflow. In the last few years before his death, Moore sat on the board of directors of Western Sierra Savings & Loan, which he founded in Placerville in addition to raising horses and cattle on his 365-acre ranch.

“I remember him describing the 15-cent rides he used to take on the Red Car,” said Moore’s son, Arnold, referring to the now-defunct street cars that operated across Los Angeles.

“He would start from Venice Beach and get off on Hollywood Boulevard near the mouth of Laurel Canyon, where he would hike up and go deer hunting. He saw Los Angeles grow from bean fields to the sprawling metropolis it is today,” Arnold Moore said.

Moore is survived by his wife, Josephine French Moore of Placerville; two sons, Christopher M. Moore of Palos Verdes Estates and Prentiss Arnold Moore of Van Nuys; a sister, Jannie Lee Johnson of Redondo Beach, and three grandchildren.

A memorial service will be held Thursday at Memory Chapel in Placerville.