Criminal Trial Takes a Toll on Attorney : Accused: Lawyer, charged with perjury, falsifying evidence, testified that his daughter’s life was threatened after he asked to take a blood test in a paternity suit.

The burden of being the defendant in a criminal trial took its toll on a prominent Newport Beach attorney Wednesday as he broke into tears after two days on the witness stand.

William Yacobozzi Jr., 50, testified that his 8-year-old daughter’s life was threatened after he asked to take a blood test to prove that he was not the father of a child in a paternity dispute.

Yacobozzi, who is accused of falsifying evidence in the paternity case, read from a threatening greeting card he said he received after offering to take the test.

“You don’t have a chance,” Yacobozzi read. “If you take another blood test, your daughter will be dead.”

When his lawyer, Grover Porter, asked how he felt when he received the card, Yacobozzi swallowed back tears and replied: “My daughter is very precious to me.”

Prosecutors said that they were not told of the card’s existence until Tuesday.

Yacobozzi, a 16-year veteran lawyer, is charged with one count of falsifying evidence, one count of conspiracy to obstruct justice and five counts of perjury. If convicted, he could face up to four years in prison and lose his license to practice law.

The charges stem from a 1988 paternity suit filed by Coleen Walters, who claimed that he was the father her son, now 6.

In that case, which has since been settled out of court, Yacobozzi was ordered to take a blood test at the Parentage Testing Center at Long Beach Memorial Medical Center. That test concluded that there was a 99.3% chance that Yacobozzi fathered the child.

Yacobozzi claimed that he wasn’t satisfied with the testing method and its results. He asked for, and was granted, a DNA test, which would precisely determine parentage. The results of the March 5, 1990, test showed that he is not the child’s biological father.

Prosecutors, however, alleged that Yacobozzi sent a substitute to the Long Beach hospital, who identified himself as Yacobozzi, to take the DNA test. They also accused the defendant of giving his driver’s license to the alleged impostor to use for identification,

Yacobozzi testified that he took the March 5, 1990, test and denied sending anyone to take his place. He also denied ever having a sexual relationship with Walters.

Yacobozzi testified that in May, 1990, during the civil trial, he asked that he, along with Walters and her son, take a third blood test together.

After criminal charges were filed against him in June, 1990, Yacobozzi authorized his attorney to make the same offer to the district attorney’s office, Yacobozzi said.

However, Deputy Dist. Atty. Wallace J. Wade said his office never received the offer from Yacobozzi to take a third blood test.

“Mr. Yacobozzi, are you making this up as you go along?” Wade asked.

“No, you don’t make up what I’ve been through,” the defendant replied.

Such questions and answers dotted the two-day cross-examination in which the prosecutor and Yacobozzi periodically threw verbal jabs at each other.

Yacobozzi also testified that after he offered to take the third test, he began receiving threatening phone calls on May 22, 1990. The next day he received the threatening greeting card, he said.