9 Deputies Plead Not Guilty in Theft Case : Scandal: They are accused of skimming $1.4 million in seized drug money. Judge sets a July 10 trial date.

Nine Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies, accused of skimming more than $1.4 million in seized drug money, pleaded not guilty on Monday to federal charges that they conspired to steal cash from drug traffickers to pay for boats, vacation homes and other lavish expenditures.

The deputies--all veteran narcotics officers--entered the pleas to various criminal charges including allegations of theft, money laundering and filing false income tax returns.

The wife of one of the deputies who, along with the others, was indicted last Thursday, also pleaded not guilty before U.S. District Judge Edward Rafeedie.

Rafeedie set a July 10 trial date for the defendants, who said they looked forward to challenging the prosecution’s case in what has become the Sheriff Department’s worst scandal in decades.

“I am totally innocent of all charges and will be vindicated in court,” said Deputy Michael J. Kaliterna, who is charged with five counts of theft, plus conspiracy and filing a false tax return. “I have done nothing illegal.”

Deputy John C. Dickenson, who was named on two counts of theft and conspiracy, also vehemently denied the allegations. “Obviously, I’m concerned,” he said Monday. “It would be crazy not to be concerned, but I wasn’t out there stealing money.”

Kaliterna and Dickenson were members of the same elite sheriff’s anti-drug team that has been the focus of a monthslong local and federal investigation and were suspended last September when the scandal was first made public.

According to the grand jury indictment, all nine narcotics investigators on that team had conspired to steal cash from drug dealers after first arresting or detaining them. Since 1988, the officers allegedly spent hundreds of thousands of dollars of stolen cash to buy everything from a piano and jewelry to a truck and a vacation home in Arizona.

In addition to Kaliterna and Dickenson, the indictment named deputies Terrell H. Amers, James R. Bauder, Nancy A. Brown, Eufrasio G. Cortez, Ronald E. Daub and Daniel M. Garner and Sgt. Robert R. Sobel. Deputy Macurio M. Duran and his wife, Maria, were also named in the indictment.

Appearing alternately relaxed and solemn, the deputies waded through an arraignment process that took them to two courtrooms and past a phalanx of reporters, photographers and television crews waiting outside the downtown courthouse. But most deputies refused comment.

“I’ll reserve my comment until the start of the trial,” said Cortez, who was named by the grand jury in 13 counts--ranging from filing a false tax return and money laundering to extortion and theft--the largest number of allegations facing any deputy.

The deputies remain free on $25,000 bail, except for Cortez, who is free on $75,000 bail. All remain on administrative leave with pay from the Sheriff’s Department, although the department notified the officers last week that it intends to suspend them without pay.

The one indicted officer who did not appear on Monday was Sobel, who has long been the central figure in the money-skimming case. A veteran sergeant who once headed the suspended narcotics crew, Sobel will be arraigned separately after reaching a plea bargain with federal prosecutors.

Sobel’s attorney, Mark Beck, said the sergeant will testify against his former narcotics team. He is expected to plead guilty later this week to single counts of conspiracy and filing a false tax return. In exchange, all five theft charges against him will be dropped.

Beck made it clear Monday that his client could play a major role in the prosecution’s case.

“The cooperation (by Sobel) has been substantial and began some time ago, shortly after the suspension,” Beck said.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Thomas A. Hagemann, who headed the federal probe into the money-skimming scandal, refused to comment on Sobel or the prosecution’s case. But he said that he remained confident that the trial could be finished by the fall.

“Assuming that the trial starts by July 10, we can be done by Sept. 1,” said Hagemann, one of the two chief prosecutors in the case.

Rafeedie, 61, is a former Superior Court judge who has handled such high-profile cases as the federal prosecutions related to the 1985 murder of U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agent Enrique Camarena.