Santa Ana Homeless Reject Deal in Sweep Case : Law enforcement: A jury trial becomes more likely as indigent defendants refuse the city’s offer to have them plead guilty and pay fines or spend a day in jail.

Twenty-two homeless people arrested in a controversial police sweep of the downtown Civic Center area are a step closer to a jury trial after their attorney rejected the city’s offer to have them plead guilty and pay fines or serve up to a day in jail.

“I think there would have been a revolt among us if he would have accepted that,” said Sharen Valentine, one of the homeless who gathered Friday for a pretrial hearing in Municipal Court. “The city is running scared right now, and it’s going to hit them where it hurts.”

Valentine, 52, wearing a tattered straw hat, was accompanied by her co-defendants, some of whom carried their belongings to court in paper sacks and overstuffed duffel bags. Sprinkled among them in the crowded courtroom were several local attorneys, including Orange County Bar Assn. President Jennifer J. King, who pledged to support the group throughout the criminal proceedings.

Deputy Public Defender Paul T. DeQuattro said he rejected the offer in order to protect his clients’ rights to trial by jury and to defend them against what he called “discriminatory practices by the city.”

“The right to a jury trial is too important for me to accept one side’s interpretation that would have us waive that right,” he said after Friday’s brief court hearing. “I am amazed they understand what’s going on, that they are interested and they have participated.”

The street people who appeared in court Friday were among the 90 arrested in August during two police roundups at Civic Center. They were charged with minor offenses, ranging from urinating in public and littering to jaywalking. The homeless were taken to Santa Ana Stadium and chained to bleachers after officers drew numbers on their arms for identification.

Some were detained several hours before being released.

The criminal court hearing Friday was scheduled just after attorneys representing the homeless in a related civil lawsuit reached a formal agreement with the city that bars city officials from targeting homeless people and other groups in similar police actions for five years.

The 22-point agreement specifically prohibits the city from taking “concerted action to drive homeless individuals from Santa Ana” and bars officials from marking the bodies of people charged with minor offenses for identification.

The civil lawsuit was supported by the Legal Aid Society of Orange County and the bar group. Legal Aid attorney Harry Simon said the group will wait until after the criminal action is completed before taking further actions against the city.

In an internal memo circulated Friday among Santa Ana police officers--after the agreement was signed in court--Deputy City Atty. Duane Bennett said that the “city and police department have not admitted any guilt, liability or wrongdoing concerning the Aug. 15 arrests.”

Sgt. Gary Adams said Bennett’s memo stated that the agreement does not bar police from conducting enforcement actions in the Civic Center area or in other areas of the city.

Adams said the memo also indicates that the agreement does not constitute a court order or judgment against the city or Police Department.

The two sides in the criminal case are scheduled to meet again Nov. 9, when Deputy City Atty. Charles H. Smith said the city will seek to have the charges reduced to lower-level infractions, which are not punishable by jail sentences.

Smith said those charged with infractions are not entitled to trials by jury and are generally not afforded the right to be represented by the public defender’s office.

Smith said this would merely speed the proceedings and is not an attempt to deny the homeless their right to jury trials.

DeQuattro said he will challenge the city’s position for those who desire a jury trial and accept the reductions for those who wish to abide by the city’s offer.

In the event that DeQuattro’s office can no longer provide representation for the homeless, King said, the bar group is lining up prominent criminal defense attorneys to take his place.

“Lawyers have a role to protect people who don’t have power,” King said.

In the meantime, Valentine, who is charged with littering public property with cigarette butts, said she will continue to live on the street.

“It’s degrading and frightening,” she said of her living conditions. “It’s something I would not want anybody to go through. But it’s amazing how the street people stick together. It’s the only way we survive.”

Valentine said she has been living on the street for about a year and a half, after losing a job in the insurance business.

“We have drug addicts and others, but there a lot of good people out here,” she said. “I would trust my street friends before I’d trust my other friends.”