County Issue D. A.’s Questioning of Raid

State Atty. Gen. Daniel E. Lungren recently assailed Ventura County Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury for leveling “gratuitous and inappropriate” criticism against the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department for its role in a drug raid that led to the death of Donald P. Scott. Was Bradbury correct in questioning the raid?

* Kenneth I. Clayman

Ventura County public defender Yes. I think as the district attorney of the county in which the raid took place, he certainly had every right to look into it and to make a legal judgment as to its appropriateness, particularly in such a tragic instance where someone was killed. From my perspective, it’s very advantageous that such inquiries are made because they shed light on what I believe is a very inequitable law, and that is the way the forfeiture laws are carried out, and in fact probably as a result of this report, the Legislature did not re-enact the forfeiture laws that were on the books at the time of the Malibu occurrence. So, in my judgment, that report shed a lot of light on the inadequacies and the unfairness of the law and, for that reason, greatly benefited the rights of all citizens to have appropriate protection when forfeiture is involved. I hope that the same concern for the rights of those who are subject to forfeiture is afforded to those indigent persons as well as those of the great wealth of Mr. Scott.

* Richard Thomas

Ventura police chief

Certainly. It’s the duty of the district attorney of any county to investigate and make the appropriate inquiries into the death of any member of the public. So not only was he within his legal right, he had an obligation to do so. I have a great deal of faith in and respect for Mike Bradbury and believe that any conclusion that he would draw would be based only on facts and evidence that would support it. I have personally heard from people who were close to that investigation that Mike Bradbury’s conclusions were accurate. I could go on to say that any of us in law enforcement do not like to be criticized for mistakes or when we haven’t handled a case in the best fashion possible. But when we goof, we have to expect a challenge. In this case, I think we need to look beyond the words that Mike chose and look at the facts evidenced by his investigation.

* Lindsay P. Miller

Simi Valley police chief The criminal justice system has a number of checks and balances in place to ensure that the system operates correctly. These levels include the district attorney, Municipal Court, Superior Court and the various appellate and supreme courts. When crimes occur and they are investigated by law enforcement agencies, those arrests and those reports are reviewed by the district attorney’s office and, generally speaking, all law enforcement actions taking place within a county can become subject to review by the district attorney’s office. In this specific case, the Ventura County district attorney’s office exercised its right to review the actions of another law enforcement agency operating within Ventura County. Now, whether or not the review as completed by the district attorney’s office was correct, I am not in a position to comment because I have not reviewed any of the reports. But the district attorney’s office exercising its authority to review the case does not appear to be an abuse of authority.

* Walt Adair

Santa Paula police chief

My feeling is of course he was correct in questioning the raid--he’s the district attorney of Ventura County. It’s my feeling that the criticism (directed at Bradbury) was politically motivated and I don’t feel it was warranted. I think he was right to investigate it, I think he was wrongfully criticized and I base that on documents that I’ve read--which include the entire summation of the district attorney’s investigation and his conclusions. It seems to me that there was not a closely supervised investigation on the part of the L. A. sheriff. But it’s over. Everyone makes mistakes. There’s a tremendous opportunity here for people to make mistakes because you have people making independent judgments all up and down the line, and I would hope that, on an investigation of this nature, there would be closer supervision. The Ventura County district attorney’s office was used to obtain the warrant in the first place, which it appears was based upon shaky information at best and, considering the outcome, Mr. Bradbury would be negligent not to investigate the incident.

* John K. Flynn

Ventura County supervisor

Yes, he was correct in his questioning of the raid and the manner in which he did it. I think the attorney general is really off base, and I say that because of the language he uses in discrediting Michael Bradbury and his research and his conclusions on this particular issue. I think it is refreshing that from time to time people in government question one another. It’s especially refreshing in law enforcement. It doesn’t happen very often--in fact, this is the first time I’ve ever heard of it happening and I think this is good for democracy, when one law enforcement officer, the chief law enforcement officer in Ventura County, questions the propriety of the actions by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. I think the Los Angeles County sheriff needs to become introspective on the issue and examine it again. I think the case itself raises some constitutional questions about the law that allows the seizure of property. In some instances, property owners have suffered from this law, and they have not been in any way involved in the trafficking of drugs. And yet, inadvertently, they’ve become victims.