MAN IN THE NEWS : Legal Tangle Made to Order for Commission’s Attorney

Much like the noted scholar and rabbi for whom he is named, attorney Hillel Chodos is, according to those who know him, an avid student of the law.

In ancient times, Hillel interpreted the Talmud, the complex and sometimes contradictory Jewish legal code. Thursday, as the lawyer for the Los Angeles Police Commission in its battle with the City Council, Chodos filed an appeal that grapples with a document that may be equally ambiguous: the Los Angeles City Charter.

As the man behind the commission’s effort to regain control over the Los Angeles Police Department, Chodos has examined every nuance of the 1925 Charter, and its 1889 predecessor, in an effort to support the panel’s contention that it, not the council, has ultimate authority to discipline the chief of police.

His colleagues say it is the kind of legal challenge Chodos relishes.

“He’s intellectually in love with the law,” said lawyer Sheldon Bardach, who shared office space with Chodos after they graduated from UCLA Law School in 1961. “I think Hillel is the kind of lawyer who is expert in conceptualizing the law. It’s a passion.”

Chodos is widely credited with pioneering the nation’s first “rent-a-judge” trial in 1976. Along with attorney Seth Hufstedler, he dusted off an 1872 statute that allowed private trials under certain circumstances, and hired a retired judge to resolve an employment dispute. What emerged was a system of private trials in which civil suits are heard by hired judges and the parties agree to abide by the judges’ decisions. Soon, rent-a-judges were deciding lawsuits across the nation.

It was Hufstedler who suggested that Chodos represent the Police Commission in the dispute over its decision to place Police Chief Daryl F. Gates on a 60-day involuntary leave. Commissioner Sam Williams, a lawyer in Hufstedler’s firm, said he asked for Hufstedler’s advice. Williams described Chodos as a “quick study who doesn’t require a lot of preparation time.”

In fact, Chodos took the case in such haste that the commission’s quick decision to hire him may have violated the state’s open meetings law, according to the city attorney’s office. The panel recently rescinded its decision, then voted in open session to rehire Chodos.

In one of the lawsuit’s many twists, the panel has no money to pay Chodos because the City Council and the city attorney contend that the Police Commission does not have the right to hire its own lawyer. Chodos says he took the case because it is a “real matter of public importance.”

Although his is hardly a household name, the 57-year-old Chodos is well-known in legal circles as an expert in complex civil business litigation. He is highly intelligent--he entered the University of Chicago at 14, graduated at 16 and was teaching college English at 17--and has an exceptional memory, which he puts to good use in the courtroom.

“We’ve tried cases that lasted weeks and weeks and he would not take notes,” said lawyer Larry Nagler, who considers Chodos his mentor. “He would not, except in the very briefest way, sketch out his examination or cross-examination of people. He did it all in his mind.”

Chodos likes working alone and prefers to stay out of the spotlight. He filed Thursday’s appeal without notifying the press, to avoid the glare of the cameras.

Nonetheless, he has had his share of publicity.

He served on the state Commission on Judicial Performance in the late 1970s, and made news in 1979 when he withdrew from the panel’s inquiry into allegations of misconduct by the state Supreme Court. At the time, Chodos criticized two justices for unnecessarily delaying the investigation, and said he could no longer “in conscience” participate.

In the early 1980s, Chodos was again thrust into the public eye as the lawyer for Betsy Bloomingdale, a prominent socialite and intimate of former First Lady Nancy Reagan, in a high-profile palimony suit filed by the mistress of Bloomingdale’s late husband. Reportedly, President Reagan asked Chodos to take the case.

Chodos is extremely reluctant to talk about himself. He is polite but firm, allowing only that he is the son of a rabbi who had pulpits in various places, among them Oklahoma City and Los Angeles. He declines to talk about his education or to make public his resume; he even went so far as to ask his mother not to talk to reporters.

Lawyers who have opposed Chodos say he believes doggedly in his clients’ positions--so much that it sometimes is difficult for him to settle a case. With his slightly rotund figure, he hardly conforms to the slick image of the Los Angeles lawyer. But he tends to win over judges and juries with his honesty and wit.

“He tells it like it is,” said Marvin Mitchelson, who opposed Chodos in the Bloomingdale case. “You know what you’re getting and there’s no pretense.”