ELECTIONS / SUPERIOR COURT JUDGE : Lawyers in Bar Survey Back Farley

By a margin of nearly 3 to 1, lawyers responding to a Ventura County Bar Assn. poll said they preferred criminal defense attorney James. M. Farley over Assistant Dist. Atty. Colleen Toy White for an open Superior Court seat, bar officials announced Thursday.

In the first judicial election poll ever conducted by the local bar, Farley received 276 votes to 97 for White, said Steve Henderson, executive director of the bar.

Ballots were mailed to the approximately 1,400 attorneys in the county, including the 900 members of the bar. Henderson said the 27% response rate is statistically significant but not a scientific barometer of lawyers’ preference in the race.

“Anything over 20% is excellent,” he said.

Results of the poll come 2 1/2 weeks before the June 7 election. The Farley-White race is the county’s only contested judicial election.

The bar’s poll is the second major announcement in the campaign this week.

On Tuesday, representatives from every major law enforcement agency in the county gathered to announce their support for White, who has been second-in-command of the district attorney’s office for 11 years.

In separate interviews Thursday, White and Farley offered different interpretations of the poll results.

Farley said the outcome illustrates that lawyers believe he is the better-qualified candidate for the judgeship, which was left vacant when Superior Court Judge Edwin Osborne retired.

Farley said lawyers are best suited to rate him and White because they work in courtrooms and with the law every day.

“I think it’s great that my peers recognize my qualifications and my experience,” said Farley, a defense lawyer for 27 years. “They want me to be their Superior Court judge.”

But White downplayed the significance of the poll, saying police officers and other law enforcement personnel who have announced their support for her deal directly with crime victims and criminals every day.

She said fewer than one-fourth of the lawyers polled returned their ballots.

“I expected that result from the plebiscite,” White said in an interview in her office. “A large number of the (bar) members make their careers defending criminals. I would have been surprised if they would have voted for someone who had their career putting criminals behind bars.”

Farley disagreed with White’s assessment of the lawyers who responded to the poll. “I’m surprised that Toy would denigrate the poll by saying it’s just a bunch of criminal lawyers.”

Others suggested that White’s support seems to be confined to the district attorney’s office, noting that more than 80 lawyers work there and she received 97 votes.

But several prosecutors who were interviewed said they did not return the bar’s poll ballots, among them Deputy Dist. Atty. James D. Ellison, who supports White.

Dennis LaRochelle, past president of the bar, said both White and Farley would make good judges. The election winner will probably be assigned to civil cases, court officials have said.

“But Jim has an edge on Toy on knowledge of the law in the civil arena,” LaRochelle said.

Other lawyers said they voted for Farley because of his extensive experience in the courtroom. They said they believe that White lacks courtroom experience because she has been an administrator instead of a trial lawyer most of her career.

“What it means to me is that lawyers recognize the need for a person who has been involved in trying cases to take a seat as a trial judge,” Ventura defense attorney Wendy Lascher said.