Family Law : In the History of the California Bench, There’s Never Been Anything Quite Like the Byrne Dynasty

MORE THAN 100 YEARS ago, Irish nationalist Peter Christopher Byrne left his homeland for North America. According to disputed family legend, he settled first in Canada, then moved to Alton, Ill.--one step ahead of authorities who wanted to question him about a cache of weapons in his basement, weapons they believed were bound for Ireland. If the story is true, it may have been the last time a Byrne was on the wrong side of the law. What’s undisputed is Peter Christopher’s quiet legacy: His grandchildren left the family’s traditional railroad jobs and became judges, lawyers, court clerks, bailiffs and probation officers, forming California’s first family of law.

One of Peter Christopher’s grandsons, William M. (Bill) Byrne, became a California legislator, a Municipal Court judge and a Superior Court judge and, for 24 years, served as a U.S. District Court judge in Los Angeles. His stint on the federal bench earned him the family nickname “Federal Bill,” because even members of the Byrne clan need a little help telling their judges apart.

Federal Bill’s son, Matt Byrne, joined his father on the federal bench in 1971 and is perhaps best known for revealing government misconduct and dismissing all the charges in the Pentagon Papers case in 1973.

One of Federal Bill’s nephews, William E. Byrne, retired from the El Dorado County Superior Court three years ago. Dubbed “Placerville Bill,” he now is in private practice in Sacramento.

One of Federal Bill’s brothers, James T. Byrne, the only Republican in the bunch, served as a Los Angeles Municipal Court commissioner from 1962 until 1974. His son, J. Michael Byrne, left the Los Angeles district attorney’s office when he became a municipal judge in 1982. Last year, he won election to the Los Angeles Superior Court, where he is one of 238 judges supervised by--you guessed it--his second cousin, presiding judge Richard (Skip) Byrne.

In all, six Byrnes have been federal or state judges or commissioners, and three sit on the bench today in Los Angeles. “They are throwbacks,” Alan Rothenberg, president of the State Bar of California, says of the Byrnes. “They believe in old-fashioned public service.”

Or as U.S. District Judge Dickran Tevrizian puts it: “It must be in the genes. Some people are born great artists, others great musicians. This must be something passed down through the generations.”

FEDERAL BILL WAS ONE OF eight children of John Byrne, a railroad fireman who settled in Oakland in the late 1800s. Shortly after the turn of the century, a wildcat strike against the railroad cost John his job, but it left him with plenty of time to hang out in Oakland, where, as another family legend has it, he became a drinking partner of author Jack London. John’s unemployment and the hard times left their mark on the next generation of Byrnes.

“With my father (James) and his generation, there was a lot of fear of seeing the poverty he grew up in and not wanting to go back to that,” says J. Michael Byrne, 46. Thus the lure of public service: It was steady, dependable work for relatively decent pay, open to those with little formal education.

A dropout before reaching high school, Federal Bill became a promising lightweight boxer, then worked as a pool-hall owner, a railroad fireman, a union leader and a state legislator before turning to law. “For him and others like him, there really weren’t any great opportunities for advancement other than by going into public service,” explains his son, Matt, 59. “Public service did afford an opportunity to play a more significant role in society.”

While serving in the California Assembly, Federal Bill attended night courses at Loyola Law School, graduating in 1929. He spent 12 years in private practice, then served on the Municipal and Superior courts before President Harry S. Truman tapped him for the federal bench in 1950.

“He had a reputation for being a rather stern man on the bench,” says U.S. District Judge Harry L. Hupp, who tried his first federal case before Federal Bill. “Both the prosecutor and I were rookies,” Hupp recalls. But instead of getting the lectures and sarcasm they expected, they found the judge a willing teacher. “He took a fatherly interest in us neophytes--calling us up to the bench to let us know if we were doing the right thing and what we were doing wrong.”

Federal Bill did much the same for members of his extended family. “He was a strong figure,” says J. Michael, describing his uncle as the family mentor. “At family gatherings, he would discuss with you your career, political affiliations and life as much as your own father.”

But sometimes his concern could be overbearing. For instance, when J. Michael and a friend announced in 1965 their plan to spend the summer registering black voters in Alabama, his own father reluctantly agreed. But the friend’s father took his objections to a higher court--Federal Bill. A fierce argument ensued as the judge forbade his nephew to go. “He was afraid I would be arrested, and it (the criminal record) would follow me around for the rest of my life,” J. Michael explains. “We went anyway.”

BY THE TIME MATT BYRNE joined his father on the federal bench in 1971, his father had been a federal judge for 21 years. A former U.S. attorney and successful trial lawyer who had served as executive director of the President’s Commission on Campus Unrest, Matt became the youngest federal judge in the country at age 40.

Now he is considered one of the smartest--and perhaps most frustrated--judges in Los Angeles federal court. With his reading glasses perched low on his nose, Matt often shrugs broadly and tells attorneys: “Well, if that’s the way you want to try your case”--leaving them wondering what they are doing wrong. He also chastises prosecutors by saying: “That’s not the way we did things when I was U.S. attorney.”

“The camaraderie of the trial of a lawsuit is a great intellectual exercise for both the lawyers and the judge, but it may be more fun for the lawyers,” says Matt, a bachelor who is a big Dodgers fan and friend of team owner Peter O’Malley and manager Tommy Lasorda. Despite Matt’s occasional look of indifference, which he says is necessary to avoid showing his feelings, he acknowledges that he enjoys the give-and-take with attorneys. Those exchanges, frequently laced with humor and sarcasm, can provide an educational but painful lesson for some attorneys.

“He’s the sharpest judge in federal court, but he may be the most bored,” says one former federal prosecutor. “He’d like to be in a courtroom where Clarence Darrow and F. Lee Bailey are slugging it out. Instead, it’s just us.”

As a result, some lawyers say, Matt is all too ready to jump in and question witnesses. “That’s the hardest thing for a judge not to do, especially someone who was a trial lawyer,” Tevrizian says. “It’s like taking a kid to a candy store and saying, ‘You can’t have any.’ ” Others, such as Assistant U.S. Attorney George Wu, say Matt questions witnesses only when a lawyer has failed to elicit key information that the judge wants. “What’s wrong with that?” Wu asks.

Although he has handled hundreds of trials, Matt is perhaps best remembered for the Pentagon Papers case. During the Vietnam War, two RAND Corp. researchers, Daniel Ellsberg and Anthony J. Russo, were charged with stealing and distributing copies of a classified study of U.S. involvement in Southeast Asia--the so-called Pentagon Papers. Matt dismissed the charges in the midst of the highly publicized trial after learning of secret government wiretaps and a White House-directed and CIA-aided break-in at the office of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist in Beverly Hills.

“The bizarre events had incurably infected the prosecution of the case,” he said in dismissing the charges. The government’s actions, he continued, “offend a sense of justice.”

Five weeks before dismissing the case, Matt revealed, he had met twice with President Richard M. Nixon’s domestic adviser, John D. Ehrlichman. The first meeting, at Nixon’s San Clemente retreat, was to ask about Matt’s interest in running the FBI. Two days later, the pair met in Santa Monica. The judge again told Ehrlichman that he could not consider the FBI post until the Pentagon Papers case was over. At the time, some people wondered if the Nixon Administration was seeking to influence the criminal case by making the job offer. If so, the ploy backfired. Matt not only revealed the meetings but also disclosed the secret wiretaps and the Ellsberg break-in, all in spite of the prosecution’s objections.

“He’s not afraid to come down as hard on the government as he is on the defense,” says Los Angeles defense attorney Anthony P. Brooklier. “He lets the chips fall where they may.”

WITHOUT THE UNIFYING influence of Federal Bill, who died at age 77 in 1974, the Byrne clan gatherings are now largely limited to weddings and funerals. Each of Peter Christopher Byrne’s grandsons and great-grandsons is now the center of his own family.

J. Michael Byrne, for instance, left Los Angeles to work in the Sacramento district attorney’s office. “I thought it would be fun to practice in an area where people didn’t know how to spell my last name,” he says. But the family tug eventually drew him back to Los Angeles. He is married to Guillermina Gutierrez Byrne, a research attorney with the California Court of Appeal. Among her brothers are Gabriel Gutierrez, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge, and Ventura Municipal Judge Art Gutierrez.

J. Michael was appointed to the Rio Hondo Municipal Court in 1982 after nine years as a deputy district attorney. Last year, he ran for and won a seat on the Los Angeles Superior Court. He credits Federal Bill with setting the example for the rest of the clan. “The respect Bill had from the rest of us--that’s, I think, what made a lot of us lean toward the law,” he says.

William E. Byrne, J. Michael’s 60-year-old first cousin, also found Federal Bill a willing adviser. Originally dubbed “Berkeley Bill” because of his parents’ hometown, William frequently turned to his uncle for guidance. After graduating from law school, Berkeley Bill came south to discuss with Federal Bill where he should set up practice.

“He told me that if he had to do it over again, he’d do it in a place where he longed to live,” Berkeley Bill recalls. So Berkeley Bill, an avid trout fisherman who liked gold rush country, established his practice in El Dorado. To the younger Byrnes, the move made him known as “Placerville Bill.”

In 1964, a seat on the El Dorado County Superior Court opened up, and Berkeley Bill again turned to Federal Bill. “He said, ‘Go ahead and apply for it.’ It would have been nice to wait five or six years, but maybe then the opportunity wouldn’t be there.” At 35, Berkeley Bill was the youngest person in the state to have been appointed to Superior Court.

During the 1970s, he presided over a liability suit involving the 1964 Hell Hole Dam failure on the Middle Fork of the American River. American River Constructors closed the unfinished dam one winter, causing the structure to give way after heavy rains. Flooding was so severe that, 18 miles downriver, trout were washed 16 feet up into the trees. American River Constructors was found negligent in what Berkeley Bill refers to as his “most challenging case,” one in which engineering experts from all over the world testified.

Two years ago, he resigned to join a Sacramento law firm. He now spends most of his time as a private judge--sometimes known as a “rent-a-judge.” He and other former judges have discovered that parties involved in lawsuits are often willing to pay for a private judge rather than wait years for a sitting judge to hear their cases. Berkeley Bill resigned from the bench because, he says, “I just decided it was long enough. I wanted a change.”

His second cousin, Skip Byrne, 56, envisions a similar change in three years, when he will have been on the Los Angeles Superior Court two decades. “I don’t want to be tied down to being a judge for the rest of my life,” he says.

Skip’s most notable case probably was the one in which he presided over the complex division of J. Paul Getty’s $4-billion trust in 1985. He was praised by attorneys for the way he handled the fractious, 19-month case, but he is quick to return the compliment: “I felt that the lawyers could, and did, bring about some reconciliation of adverse family interests.”

He was named presiding judge of the Superior Court last year and so far has received favorable reviews in what many observers call a thankless task. “He’s a good administrator who gets things done without sitting on your head,” says Superior Court Judge Alexander H. Williams III. Despite opposition from the ranks, Skip implemented the so-called fast-track system in civil court. Mandated by state law, it is an experiment in eight counties requiring judges to aggressively manage their own court calendars.

Since he became presiding judge, a position whose only real power is that of assigning his fellow judges to different courts, Skip also has instituted case-management seminars for the judges and has helped increase the use of computers to track cases through the legal system. It is a system in jeopardy, he believes--largely because of a funding shortage. “The underfunding of the judiciary deprives judges of the time necessary to pay attention to matters brought before them,” he says.

With Berkeley Bill retiring and Skip thinking about doing the same, it might seem as though the Byrne dynasty is drawing to an end--especially at a time when, Skip says, a crass new attitude prevails among many lawyers. “Traditionally, people went into law to help their fellow man,” he says. “Now the law is much more of a business. . . . A lot of young lawyers just go into the law for the money.”

But Skip and his wife, Marguerite, have six children, ranging in age from 18 to 30, and three of them have already graduated from law school with different intentions.

Mark, a 30-year-old assistant U.S. attorney, says he is carrying on a “sense of wanting to do something for the community in general.” Elizabeth, 27, was a lawyer with a downtown Los Angeles firm like her brother Matt, 26, before joining a New York-based auction house. She adds: “It is part of your greater obligation to give back to the community. In our family, you serve society through the law.”

So the family tradition continues. “Have you seen Skip’s children?” asks Hupp. “The next generation is safe. There will be some Byrne judges there.”