Hearing Ordered on Sabotage Allegation : Denny case: Judge wants to determine whether a law firm intentionally tried to subvert a defendant’s defense.

The judge overseeing the case of three men accused of beating truck driver Reginald O. Denny during the Los Angeles riots ordered Friday a hearing to determine whether a law firm hired by one of the defendants intentionally sabotaged his case.

That allegation grows out of the unraveling of the Center for Constitutional Law and Justice, the firm that until two months ago represented Damian Monroe (Football) Williams. In the last several months, the firm has fired virtually its entire legal staff. Its deputy director has been arrested on a wire fraud charge in Arkansas and representatives of the center have alleged that the organization was a front for federal law enforcement.

Compounding the intrigue, the center’s deputy director, Frederick George Celani, recorded a series of statements from jail saying that he was hired by the federal government to sabotage Williams’ case. In sometimes rambling statements, which were provided to The Times, Celani accuses the federal government of inciting the riots and says agents drugged Williams while in custody.

“It was our job to go in and get Damian as a defendant so that we could sabotage the defense,” Celani says on one tape. “That’s what we were supposed to do.”

Williams’ new lawyer, Edi M.O. Faal, conceded Friday that he has no evidence that Celani--a former prison inmate who used the alias Fred Sebastian--worked for the government. But Faal added “there is very strong evidence of sabotage.”

That suggestion highlighted Friday’s hearing before Superior Court Judge John W. Ouderkirk and marked the latest escalation in the legal battling over the case against Williams and two other men, Antoine Eugene Miller and Henry Keith (Kiki) Watson. All three are charged with attempted murder, aggravated mayhem, torture and robbery in the attack on Denny. They face charges of assaulting other motorists before and after the Denny attack.

If Williams’ lawyers can show that Celani sabotaged the defense efforts--either as a government operative or for any other reason--they intend to ask that the charges against their client be dropped or that he receive a new preliminary hearing.

Faal declined to elaborate on how Celani and the center allegedly sabotaged Williams’ defense. But Dennis Palmieri, who worked for the center and represented Williams during his preliminary hearing, has said Celani ordered him to withdraw a motion to suppress a statement that Williams gave to police while in custody.

Because the motion was withdrawn, the statement was played in the preliminary hearing. It includes passages that damage Williams’ defense, including one in which he admits that he was at the scene of the attack and that he hit Denny with a rock.

“Decisions were being taken away from me,” Palmieri said Friday. “It begins to emerge as a pattern when you look at it in hindsight, and that pattern is very, very questionable.”

On the tapes, Celani says the center was created by federal law enforcement authorities and used to subvert the due process rights of accused criminals in this case and others. He also says he enjoyed immunity from prosecution.

Officials in Los Angeles and Washington deny those allegations and dismiss Celani’s statements as ridiculous. Even other defense lawyers involved in the case are skeptical of his assertions.

Still, prosecutors said the matter deserves full investigation.

“However bizarre and extraterrestrial it is on its face,” said prosecutor Frank Sundstedt, “I think present counsel has an obligation to investigate and litigate this issue.”

Faal said he intended to call Palmieri as a witness during the hearing, which Ouderkirk set for Nov. 20. Later, Faal also indicated that he may call two of the center’s other former lawyers as well.

In addition, Faal is seeking copies of the tapes provided to The Times. Ouderkirk ordered a Times reporter to appear in court that day as a possible witness.