Flagpole Defender Ends Flap : Zoning: After a three-year dispute, a Torrance homeowner agrees not to put up giant flagpoles for at least a year.

The Torrance patriot whose towering flagpole almost landed him behind bars has given up his three-year fight.

David B. Shaw, who was to stand trial in South Bay Municipal Court Wednesday for refusing to remove a 51-foot flagpole from his front lawn, promised instead to keep his yard free of all giant flagpoles for at least one year.

If Shaw keeps his pledge, the city prosecutor’s office will drop four misdemeanor zoning violations now pending against him. Conviction could cost Shaw $2,000 in fines and up to a year in the County Jail.

“They’re going to keep an eye on me and make sure I don’t put it up again,” Shaw said later. “I’m done with 50-foot flagpoles.”

A 37-year-old concrete contractor who first erected the flagpole at his Hollywood Riviera home in 1988, Shaw said he finally surrendered because he couldn’t afford the battle.

“I’m a business man . . . fighting the recession, trying to keep my people in jobs,” Shaw said. “Right now, it’s a matter of survival.”

Shaw took the flagpole down with a crane July 17, one week before his trial was to begin. In one last hurrah, however, he flew a tattered Old Glory above his home for several weeks to protest what he considered the trampling of his civil rights.

“It didn’t look that great, but it kind of symbolized the whole thing to me,” Shaw said.

The flap over Shaw’s $75 flagpole started almost immediately after he and a group of friends put it up in 1988. Neighbors complained that the flagpole blocked their ocean views and that the flapping flag made too much noise.

In May, 1989, the Planning Commission decreed the flagpole could stand no higher than 24 feet. When Shaw tried to appeal that decision, the City Council ordered the height further reduced to 14 feet.

Unwilling to comply with such standards, Shaw soon agreed to take the pole down entirely. But in January he resurrected it--all 51 feet of it--to demonstrate his support for U.S. involvement in the Persian Gulf War.

Fed up with Shaw’s actions, Torrance City Prosecutor Jesse I. Rodriguez charged him in April with failing to obtain the proper construction permits, violating the neighborhood’s height limits and failing to conform with zoning and planning standards.

Shaw was scheduled to stand trial Wednesday morning in the courtroom of South Bay Municipal Judge Josh M. Fredricks. But after hearing Shaw had removed the flagpole, Fredricks agreed to dismiss the case in one year.

In describing the compromise he had worked out with Shaw, Rodriguez told the judge he sympathized with Shaw’s desire to fly a flag. But he said that Shaw nevertheless had violated several city zoning codes in erecting the giant flagpole.

“I fly my flag every single day when I go home,” Rodriguez said. “At no time did I prosecute, or attempt to prosecute, Mr. Shaw for flying the flag. In fact, I wish I could prosecute all those who desecrate the flag.”

The aluminum flagpole will remain on its side in Shaw’s yard until he can find another place for it. Shaw said he may consider putting up a smaller flagpole next year, but as far as he’s concerned, “It’s the end of the 50-footer. That’s for sure.”