Accused Defends His Honor: Some Charges Are Worse Than Murder

Items with an attitude.

* A San Diego gang member didn’t mind being arraigned on charges of murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

But that stuff about committing “overt acts” (“in furtherance of a conspiracy”) offended his sense of machismo.

He complained to the judge: “I don’t do overt acts. I don’t go for that funny sex stuff.”

* Some decisions in police work require a lot of consideration. Some don’t.

Here’s one of the latter.

The producer for the new “Morton Downey Jr. Show,” a cable TV effort to revive Downey’s shout-and-scream-and-blow-smoke act, wanted someone from the San Diego Police Department for a show titled “Taking the Law Into Your Hands.”

The San Diego cop would be expected to assert that law enforcement is working just dandy these days and then withstand the assaults of Downey and others.

The P.D.’s answer: Thanks, but no thanks.

* You bet your state.

As the state Assembly struggled Tuesday night to pass a budget before midnight, bored members amused themselves by placing bets on what time the vote would occur.

Steve Peace (D-Rancho San Diego) won $6 by predicting when Mike Gotch (D-San Diego) and Bob Frazee (R-Carlsbad) would switch their votes.

* San Diego has just been named by Tennis magazine as the second-best tennis city in America.

No. 1 is St. Cloud, Minn., where the winter program is called “Tundra Tennis.”

* Looking for Mr. Whitebread.

To inaugurate its new six-times-daily service between San Diego and Sacramento, Southwest Airlines is having a Gov. Pete Wilson Look-Alike Contest next Thursday at Lindbergh Field.

Grand prize is two round-trip tickets anywhere Southwest flies.

As contestants prepare, look for a run on Wilsonesque short haircuts, brown shoes and light-gray suits with skinny lapels.

Phony Tee Times

Teed off.

Remember that, for golfers, getting a reservation at super-busy Torrey Pines Municipal Golf Course during the summer is the equivalent of getting a front-row seat at Lourdes.

Yes, but a brand-new and long-awaited computerized telephone system for making reservations is supposed to make it easier: seven live lines, compared to the old four (one live, three on hold).

No longer will you hear busy signals for hours before getting through. No longer will people with automatic redialing have a damnably unfair advantage.

But now the system has had its first major glitch, leaving dozens of foursomes in various states of annoyance.

Due to Operator Error, a list of several dozen people who called on a recent morning got misplaced in the computer. And their tee times were inadvertently given away to people who called in later.

When the error was discovered, Park and Recreation Department employees had to summon their courage and telephone the unfortunates: “Sorry, a computer glitch wiped you out. Somebody else has your time now.”

The more irate were offered replacement times, although in most cases at a less desirable time and day.

Among the angriest is San Diego attorney Larry Ford, who lost a coveted 10:23 a.m. reservation for Saturday: “I kept pushing, pushing, pushing about how stupid this is.”

He’s not buying the idea that, for computer reasons, it’s easier to bump the early callers rather than the later callers.

The fun isn’t over yet. About 10 foursomes could not be reached by telephone and will arrive at Torrey Pines this weekend unaware they’ve been dumped.

Prepare for blue language among the greens.

Cultivating an Airport

Grounded?

The latest in experimental aircraft is the tilt-rotor, vertical-lift plane being built for the Navy.

Maybe that’s what San Diego Councilwoman Abbe Wolfsheimer had in mind this week when she asked whether the proposed binational airport could accommodate these new “rototiller” planes.

Then again, maybe not.