Judge Stops La Vina Trial Before It Gets Under Way
The first day of a long-delayed trial over the county’s handling of the La Vina Housing Development came to a sudden halt last week when Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Stephen E. O’Neil removed the case from his calender.
Citing the failure of both the county and Friends of La Vina to properly prepare court documents, O’Neil ordered that the documents be rewritten to conform to court requirements.
Attorneys’ aides said that O’Neil admonished the lawyers for the county and Friends of La Vina for attempting to circumvent his 50-page limit on their legal briefs by changing type size and single-spacing footnotes.
O’Neil declined to elaborate, saying he could not comment on a case in progress.
Southwest Diversified, one of the project’s developers and a party to the lawsuit, applauded O’Neil’s decision and quickly asked the court to dismiss the suit, saying that a November deadline for deciding the case had passed. However, the motion for dismissal was denied on Tuesday and the trial has tentatively been rescheduled for Jan. 12.
“The decision came as quite a shock to us,” said Abraham R. Brown, an attorney for Friends of La Vina.
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