Judge Sues Opponent Over Mailer : Election: Dutcher contends his challenger libeled him in attacks on sentencing of a drunk driver who killed a boy.

Municipal Court Judge Daniel C. Dutcher has filed a lawsuit against the opponent he will face in a Nov. 8 runoff for his seat, alleging she and her campaign produced a libelous mailer and advertisement that cost him victory in the June primary.

The suit involves campaign material sent out by Deputy Dist. Atty. Caryl Lee, who is challenging Dutcher. The material accused Dutcher of being too lenient in his sentencing of Matthew Wilbur, a repeat drunk driver who struck and killed 13-year-old Jeff Martinez last year.

The boy’s parents are featured in the material, saying that Dutcher “freed” their son’s killer, failed to take into account 2,000 signatures they had collected asking Dutcher to require bail for Wilbur and sentenced him to “one year actual jail time” even though the district attorney’s office “demanded a stronger sentence.”

Dutcher’s lawsuit says Lee’s campaign knew those allegations were false. The mailers hurt his reputation and cost him a victory in the primary, he said.

“They didn’t bend the truth-- they broke it, and they knew they broke it,” Dutcher said Thursday.

“These people have demonstrated in the past six months they just have a very low regard for truth, and I’m tired of it.”

Also named in the suit are Bruce Bridgman, an attorney and campaign manager for the Committee to Elect Caryl Lee for Judge, and Linda Rovito, a member of the committee.

Dutcher filed the suit Tuesday in Orange County Superior Court, also naming Jeff Martinez’s parents, Ed and Gail Martinez. But an amended claim filed Wednesday no longer names the couple, and Dutcher said his attorney had included them against his wishes.

Lee, who edged Dutcher in the June primary’s tightest judicial race by 38.1% to 38%, called Dutcher’s suit “outrageous” and an “abridgment of the First Amendment.”

The Wilbur case is fair game for scrutiny during an election, added Jeff Adler, who heads Lee’s campaign management firm.

“Filing a lawsuit like this in the heat of a campaign is an act of absolute cowardice and desperation,” Adler said. “A judge’s record is open to the public to review, and this was a case that even before the election was being questioned by members of the public.”

Dutcher’s suit alleges that to have taken the Martinezes’ petitions into consideration would have violated the California Code of Judicial Conduct, which bars judges from considering outside communications while a matter is pending before the court.

Dutcher also said that the police, not he, had released Wilbur, and that the district attorney’s office never objected to Wilbur’s no-contest plea, as the Martinez mailer alleges. He also said that he sentenced Wilbur to two years in state prison, not one year in jail as the mailer suggested.

Dutcher said that, if nothing else, he hopes the lawsuit will keep the Martinez mailer out of the race as the runoff date nears.

“I don’t want to see that piece at the end of October,” he said. “I’m really quite frankly more interested in stopping them from lying about me in the future than I am about enriching myself at their expense.”