Hearing on Judge’s Conduct Kept Closed by High Court

A disciplinary hearing into allegations against veteran Municipal Judge Calvin P. Schmidt began in secrecy Thursday after the California Supreme Court rejected a plea to make public the investigation of charges that the judge gave preferential courtroom treatment to his friends.

The state Commission on Judicial Performance, which is meeting in Santa Ana on the Schmidt affair, had sought to open its proceedings under a state constitutional amendment approved by the voters last fall.

The measure, known as Proposition 92, permits the commission to make public its confidential proceedings when a judge is accused of moral turpitude, dishonesty or corruption.

But lawyers for Schmidt, 59, who faces allegations of extending favorable treatment to his friends and leniency to defendants in exchange for sexual favors for others, filed suit to keep the hearing closed. They said that opening the hearing to the public could cause “irreparable injury” to the judge.

The attorneys contended that the commission could not open its proceedings until the state Judicial Council, the rule-making arm of the judiciary, adopted guidelines to implement the constitutional amendment.

The commission, in turn, argued that the Schmidt case, as the focus of widespread public attention and controversy, was a “classic example” of the need to hold a prompt and open proceeding.

In June, Orange County Superior Court Judge James L. Smith Jr. upheld Schmidt’s claim and ordered the hearing closed. A state Court of Appeal refused to overturn the ruling and the commission took the case to the state Supreme Court, arguing that there was no need for guidelines because the amendment was “self-implementing”--and a closed hearing would undermine the public’s confidence in the judiciary.

However, the state Supreme Court refused Thursday in San Francisco to grant a review of the case.

Peter Gubbins, an attorney for the commission, said the agency will now pursue a separate appeal previously filed before the state appellate court in Santa Ana that will deal with the broader issue of whether the commission can hold open hearings at its discretion.

Gubbins said that appeal could take years to resolve and it is unlikely that it will affect Schmidt’s case, which the attorney said could last between six and 10 days.

Thursday, about a dozen witnesses appeared before the three-judge panel, which met in the new state Court of Appeal building in Santa Ana. The panel was composed of Justice Jack Goertzen of the 2nd District Court of Appeal in Los Angeles, Municipal Judge Ernest Borunda of San Diego and retired Los Angeles Municipal Court Judge James E. Satt.

The witnesses Thursday said the panel was focusing its questions on Schmidt’s decision last year to free from jail without bail the daughter of an influential Newport Beach family who had been arrested on drug-related charges. Family members were friends of Schmidt.

Testifying Thursday were members of the family, another Municipal Court judge involved in the case, a police officer involved in the arrest of the daughter and a court detention release employee.

Shirlee Guggenheim, the mother of Terri Ann McMullen, 28, who was arrested twice and freed by Schmidt, told reporters she had been subpoenaed along with her husband, M. Robert Guggenheim, the grandson of millionaire industrialist Meyer Guggenheim, to testify.

McMullen was arrested the first time in March, 1988, in an Orange motel and charged with possessing two ounces of cocaine in her purse, according to court records. Three others were arrested and one, according to police reports, had 29 pounds of marijuana and a kilo of cocaine in his car, those records show.

Even though her bail was set at $15,000 and a defense motion to free her without bail was denied by another judge, Schmidt telephoned detention release officials and ordered her freed on her own recognizance, according to court records.

After failing to appear for her preliminary hearing on the cocaine possession charge, McMullen was picked up Oct. 4, 1988, by Garden Grove police on a shoplifting complaint. Police found cocaine in her purse, according to court records.

Two days later, Schmidt again called detention officials to have McMullen freed, the court records show. Even though the officials pointed out that she was not a good risk for release without bail, Schmidt insisted and detention officials let her go on her own recognizance, according to court records.

Municipal Judge Richard A. Stanford set McMullen’s bail at $250,000 and ordered that it not be reduced by anyone after she failed to appear again 16 days after she was arrested the second time, court records show.

Stanford also appeared at the hearing Thursday in Santa Ana but declined to discuss the case, although he said the panel had not admonished him not to discuss the case.

Shirlee Guggenheim said Thursday she did not know if her daughter, who is in jail on a subsequent drug-related charge, would be brought to the hearing to testify.

Campaign spending reports show that the Guggenheims made a $500 campaign contribution to Schmidt in 1985.

Additional charges that have been raised against Schmidt, according to sources, include:

- An offer by Schmidt to help reinstate the driver’s license of convicted prostitute Della Christine Johnson in 1984 in exchange for a promise of sex. She told police that Municipal Judge Brian R. Carter later contacted her and collected on the debt by having sex with her, according to a police report. Carter, who was also being investigated by the commission, announced that he was resigning from the bench. The commission then announced that it had dropped its probe.

- Contributing money from his campaign to other candidates running for non-judicial offices. Some of the donations were larger than the amounts allowed by state judicial canons, according to campaign reports. Former Democratic state Sen. Paul Carpenter of Cypress received $20,000 in loans from Schmidt and $10,000 was later repaid. The state Fair Political Practices Commission said the $10,000 loan that was forgiven is the same as a campaign contribution. The limit was $500 per non-judicial candidate per year.

Schmidt, who has served on the bench longer than any other judge in Orange County, is one of six judges at Harbor Municipal Court in Newport Beach to come under commission scrutiny.

Hager reported from San Francisco and Frank reported from Orange County.