SANTA ANA : Reporter Named in Restraining Order

The president of the Orange Unified School District Board of Trustees obtained a restraining order Thursday against a reporter for a local newspaper, who was accused of harassing and threatening the trustee and his family.

The court order, issued by Commissioner Eleanor Palk, prohibits Robert Bennyhoff, 71, managing editor of Common Talk, a free monthly paper distributed in Orange and Villa Park, from coming within 150 yards of Barry Resnick. The court order does allow Bennyhoff to continue covering meetings of the Orange district trustees.

Resnick, elected to the board in 1989, was one of the two members who was not the subject of a recent failed recall attempt by a group of local parents.

Bennyhoff, in his editorial column in Common Talk, had not supported the recall efforts. However, he has been critical of Resnick’s performance on the board.

The fracas between the two men that led to Thursday’s action in Municipal Court in Santa Ana apparently began Nov. 12, when Resnick called Bennyhoff to ask for a retraction of a statement in a column Bennyhoff had written for the newspaper, according to both men.

In a report filed Sunday with the Orange Police Department, Resnick alleged that Bennyhoff had threatened his family during the phone conversation.

Bennyhoff denied Resnick’s charges to detectives, and the Police Department let the matter drop.

“I did not make the threats,” Bennyhoff said in an interview Thursday. “If they want to arrest me, here I am. If they want to tap my phone, here I am.”

A court hearing is set Dec. 3 to determine whether the restraining order should be made permanent.