ORANGE COUNTY PERSPECTIVE : How Not to Conduct a Trial

The 1992 Santa Ana trial of orthopedic surgeon Thomas A. Gionis on charges of arranging an attack on his estranged wife, the daughter of actor John Wayne, displayed such a high profile that Court TV, a national cable channel, chose to cover it. It also has turned out to be an example of how the district attorney’s office should not conduct a trial.

The 4th District Court of Appeal this week overturned Gionis’ conviction on four felony charges stemming from the alleged attack on Aissa Wayne and her boyfriend in 1988, while she and Gionis were engaged in a bitter custody battle.

The court said the trial judge wrongly allowed testimony from a lawyer who had represented Gionis in a civil case. But even without that, the court said, then Deputy Dist. Atty. Jeoffrey A. Robinson engaged in a personal attack on Gionis’ trial lawyer, Bruce Cutler, that was so over-the-top excessive as to warrant reversing the jury’s decision.

The court rapped Robinson for his “vitriolic rebuttal and personal attacks” on Cutler, best known as the lawyer for New York mobster John Gotti. Robinson, now in private practice, rejected the criticism, saying Gionis got a fair trial. Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi agreed.

But the district attorney’s office should make prosecutors aware of the court’s reasoning. The same appeals court had warned Robinson about his conduct in another case, and this time it justifiably noted the unnecessary cost taxpayers would bear if the case is tried a third time. Gionis’ first trial, with a different prosecutor and defense attorney, ended with a hung jury.

More important than money is justice. It would be as bad to be forced to free a guilty man or woman because of prosecutorial misconduct as to convict an innocent person. This case should remind prosecutors of the need to follow the rules.