Judge Finds No Proof Baker Violated Rules of Sentencing

Superior Court Judge Myron S. Brown said Thursday that he has reviewed material submitted by the Orange County district attorney’s office and found no evidence that former Irvine City Councilman C. David Baker had violated the terms of his sentence for check forgery.

“This court has received nothing from anyone suggesting that anything improper took place,” Brown said.

“If I did not believe that Mr. Baker had not satisfactorily completed his probation, I would not have terminated his probation,” said Brown, who added that the Baker case is a closed matter “simply because it was never reopened.”

Brown acknowledged that he received a letter and accompanying documents from the district attorney’s office last week dealing with Baker’s community service sentence. Brown, who presided over the Baker forgery case, reduced Baker’s felony conviction to a misdemeanor and sentenced the 36-year-old lawyer to one-year probation and 500 hours of community service.

The documents received by the judge were all from Baker’s Costa Mesa attorney, Paul S. Meyer, who had submitted the material first to the district attorney’s office. Some were statements declaring that Baker performed his community service. Others were copies of checks to show that he paid for the gasoline and service for a free company car he received while performing his community service.

In January, the judge agreed to terminate Baker’s probation after Meyer offered evidence that his client had completed the community service, thus satisfying his obligation. Baker’s probation, however, did not officially end until May 12 as ordered by Brown.

In an article last month, the Times Orange County Edition reported that Baker had accepted use of a 1989 Cadillac and negotiated a $120,000-a-year job while doing court-ordered community service for a local youth organization, Sports Kids. The executive director of the organization, Chuck Foster, told The Times that he withheld $80,000 that he owed Baker in salary for work done after he had performed the court-ordered community service.

In that article, Deputy Dist. Atty. Christopher J. Evans, who prosecuted the original Baker case, was quoted as saying that he intended to investigate whether Baker had violated his probation.

The article also reported that Baker, who left Sports Kids in April, and his father loaned $20,000 to the Irvine-based organization founded by former Olympian Bob Mathias. Foster said he has withheld repayment of that loan because he feared the payment might violate terms of Baker’s sentence.

In a letter to Judge Brown dated June 29, Evans said his office had received information, primarily the Times story, regarding Baker’s community service sentence. Evans also pointed out that Baker’s attorney had volunteered letters and other information to substantiate that Baker had properly performed his community service.

“I have evaluated the information that we have received and in light of Mr. Baker’s probationary status at the time he submitted the proof of his service to the court, we feel the probation department or the marshal’s office would be more appropriate organizations to further investigate if the court feels that is required,” Evans said in his letter.

Evans also stated, “Some persons have apparently suggested that either he (Baker) did not do his service to the extent he represented it to the court or that he was compensated for the service rather than performing ‘Volunteer’ activities,” the letter to Brown says.

Just days before the 1988 primary election to replace retiring U.S. Rep. Robert E. Badham, Baker, an early favorite to win, forged the signature of an officer of the Irvine Health Foundation on a $48,000 check from the foundation and deposited it in his personal account. Baker was then executive director of the foundation.

Baker, whose congressional campaign was short on cash, stopped payment on the check shortly after he deposited it and the forgery was not discovered until after the June primary election, which Baker narrowly lost.