County Redistricting Trial Heads Toward Conclusion : Politics: In his closing argument, attorney for Latinos accuses L.A. supervisors of ‘racial gerrymandering.’

As closing arguments began Wednesday in the three-month-long redistricting trial, a civil rights attorney accused Los Angeles County supervisors of “racial gerrymandering” to prevent the election of a Latino to the board and protect their seats.

“It endures as an irreducible truth of this case that since 1875, no individual with a Spanish surname has served on the Board of Supervisors,” said Mark Rosenbaum of the American Civil Liberties Union.

The historic trial is scheduled to end Friday after attorneys for the U.S. Justice Department, a plaintiff in the case, present closing arguments, followed by the county’s lawyers.

In a suit filed in September, 1988, the plaintiffs accused the supervisors of fragmenting many of the county’s 3 million Latinos among three districts, thereby weakening their political influence in violation of the federal Voting Rights Act.

U.S. District Judge David V. Kenyon has been asked by the plaintiffs to delay the June supervisors’ election until after a new redistricting plan is drafted.

The plaintiffs want the now-divided Latino neighborhoods in East Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Valley put in the same district so that a Latino would have an improved chance of winning a seat on the five-member board. The ACLU and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund have asked the judge to expand the board by an unspecified number. Kenyon has not said when he will rule.

In his 3 1/2-hour statement, Rosenbaum said the absence of a Latino on the board “gnaws . . . at the belly of this community.”

Though board members have publicly advocated creation of a Latino district, “no supervisor would let his district become the Hispanic district,” Rosenbaum said. “Every Anglo incumbent has understood that it has been in his political self-interest to leave the Hispanic community weak and divided.”

Rosenbaum pointed to testimony that supervisors carried out the 1981 redistricting by a private “revolving door” meeting of two supervisors at a time to sidestep a state law requiring that discussions involving three or more supervisors be conducted in public.

Contending that Latinos became a “pawn” in a battle for control of the board, Rosenbaum argued that conservative board members only wanted to increase the Latino makeup in liberal Supervisor Ed Edelman’s district and liberal supervisors only wanted to shift Latinos to conservative Pete Schabarum’s district.

“In this case,” Rosenbaum said, “the Hispanic community asserts its rights that they be only and finally on equal footing with the county’s Anglo citizens.”

Richard Fajardo of MALDEF reviewed testimony from historians about the history of discrimination against Latinos, including lynchings of Mexican-Americans during the late 19th Century. Among the factors that can be considered in determining whether there has been a violation of voting rights is a history of discrimination against minorities.

In a preview of their final argument, county attorneys presented the judge with a 116-page brief contending that the supervisors have been unable to create a Latino district, not for discriminatory reasons, but “an inability to find common ground on how.”

The highly technical case has focused on conflicting testimony by demographers and statisticians on whether a district with a majority of Latino voters can be created.

The plaintiffs must prove that it is possible to carve out a district with a majority of Latino voters. County attorneys contended that such a district could not be created during the 1981 redistricting--or today--because many Latinos are not citizens or old enough to vote.