Council’s Ex-Gadfly Won’t Do Jail Time : Justice: A judge ordered Al Ramirez to perform community service for disrupting a meeting.

Political gadfly Al Ramirez, who was convicted in 1989 of disrupting a Pomona City Council meeting by shouting at the mayor and demanded that the judge send him to jail rather than impose a fine, will not be serving time after all.

Ramirez, 65, who regularly bombards public officials, the news media and others with letters alleging political corruption, appealed his misdemeanor conviction on free speech grounds.

He won a brief victory when the Superior Court Appellate Department last year tentatively decided to throw out the conviction because a prospective juror had been excused solely because she was unemployed and the prosecutor preferred jurors with jobs.

But the appellate judges rethought the issue and reversed their opinion.

The state Court of Appeal and the state Supreme Court subsequently refused to hear the case, which brought Ramirez back to Pomona Municipal Court for resentencing Friday before Judge Jack Hunt.

In 1989, after being convicted, Ramirez told Hunt: “You’re going to have to send me to jail. I’m not paying any fine. . . . What I’ve done is a matter of conscience.”

Hunt refused to send Ramirez to jail and offered him the option of performing 25 hours of community service. The sentence was stayed by the appeals.

When he returned to court for resentencing Friday, Ramirez said he had not decided whether to accept community service or insist on going to jail.

But Hunt solved the question for him. The judge ruled that Ramirez, whose wife has been ill, had performed at least 25 hours of community service by taking care of her. Hunt declared that Ramirez had fulfilled the requirement and dismissed the case.

Hunt said Ramirez, who had been intractable in previous court appearances, was contrite Friday. In addition, the judge noted, Ramirez has moved to Hemet and no longer attends Pomona City Council meetings, where his behavior had led to three disruption charges in six months.

Ramirez said he does not attend Hemet City Council meetings but has become involved in several issues through letters to local newspapers and other means.

He “wants to call it quits,” Ramirez said, but he keeps finding new causes. He said he started a “Save the Crows” campaign in Hemet to try to stop people from shooting the birds. He sold his pickup truck to buy $2,500 worth of stamps a year ago to send letters across the nation urging protests against the Persian Gulf War.

Ramirez said he appreciated Hunt’s fairness in ending the Pomona case.

“I’m grateful to him,” he said. “It was a resolution that was needed.”

But Ramirez, who said he spent $25,000 fighting the case, said he still thinks he has a right to resist what he regards as an infringement on free speech.

“The only thing that separates us from slavery,” he said, “is that document called the U.S. Constitution.”