Garcetti Faces Political Pitfalls at Every Turn

The decision not to pursue the death penalty for O.J. Simpson shows the political dangers that wait at every at step of the case for Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti.

Praise and criticism were flowing before the sun set Friday, the day prosecutors made, and Garcetti affirmed, the long-awaited announcement.

Logically, politics shouldn’t be a consideration in a trial of this man accused of the brutal murder of his ex-wife, Nicole Simpson, and her friend Ronald Lyle Goldman. Justice should be administered on the basis of facts developed in a courtroom, isolated from the clamor of the outside world.

But the legal system has never been free of outside pressure. Long before television, many a man was hustled off to the gallows by juries acting under the influence of inflammatory newspaper stories. But the atmosphere is much more explosive today. Television is having a love affair with criminal trials. In addition, crime is the hottest political issue here and elsewhere in the country.

As a result, every move by Garcetti is magnified by television and then examined by the voters who elected him in 1992 and who will decide whether to reelect him in 1996.

*

The handsome, tightly controlled Garcetti--robocop in a business suit--looks like a politician on the move in the law- and-order era. Convicting Simpson would be a big help, reversing a string of major losses under him and his predecessors, losses that were partially responsible for the election defeats of two previous D.A.s, Ira Reiner and Bob Philibosian.

On Thursday morning, I visited a man who has a unique perspective on the situation, John K. Van de Kamp, district attorney and state attorney general before losing a race for governor in 1990. He’s a thoughtful conversationalist, a contrast to the television legal experts who remind me of Dick Vitale, the loudmouth basketball commentator.

As D.A., Van de Kamp was the boss of lawyers on both sides of the Simpson case. Johnnie L. Cochran Jr., part of the Simpson team, was one of Van de Kamp’s top assistants. And Van de Kamp hired William Hodgman as a deputy D.A. Hodgman is co-prosecutor with Marcia Clark.

When he was D.A., Van de Kamp caught considerable political flak on the Hillside Strangler case in 1981. Van de Kamp was criticized when he decided to charge murder suspect Angelo Buono with a sex crime because prosecutors felt the main witness against him was shaky. But a judge overruled Van de Kamp, ordering a murder trial. The state attorney general’s office subsequently won a murder conviction.

The job of D.A., Van de Kamp said, has always been full of risks. “The job hasn’t changed so much, but we’re living in more complicated times,” he said. “You’re on the hot seat every day in that job. . . . The D.A. is constantly dealing with cases the press is interested in,” he said. “I think it is more complicated to be D.A. today because of television and the insatiable need of the television media to cover ‘news.’ ”

Another factor, he said, “is a greater skepticism now about officialdom. Police are treated more as regular witnesses today rather than coming in with a presumption of total integrity.”

I asked him about the prosecution’s performance so far.

“I think they have been running against the clock to get their evidence in hand . . . because (co-defense attorney Robert L.) Shapiro has pushed them into a quick trial, which may have been good strategy on his part. . . . I’m not sure they have all the DNA testing done. They are under a very tight timetable for that. It’s very important in this particular case because of the fact that there are no eyewitnesses. So the scientific evidence becomes very important.”

*

We talked a day before Garcetti made his decision against seeking the death penalty, but even then, Van de Kamp said he thought that was what the D.A. should do. “If you look at the history of the way jurors look (at such cases), assuming it was a husband-wife emotionally fraught situation, juries don’t execute in these kind of cases,” Van de Kamp said.

That kind of support helps Garcetti, as does backing from several law professors. But just after he made his announcement, Garcetti was criticized by an attorney who may be trouble for him, Leslie Abramson, the lawyer for Erik Menendez. Menendez and his brother face a second trial for the murder of their parents. As he did in their first trial, which ended with a hung jury, Garcetti is seeking the gas chamber.

Abramson, a media star since the Menendez trial, said she agreed with Garcetti’s decision on the Simpson case, but said he should do the same for the Menendez brothers. “He went for this because there is a political component and the African American community is already up in arms,” she said.

Criticism also came from Deputy Dist. Atty. Sterling Norris, who ran against Garcetti in 1992 and may oppose him in 1996. He faulted Garcetti for not having the police jail Simpson when he was first questioned. Instead, authorities waited several days before an arrest, giving Simpson a chance to take his famed freeway ride that Norris said “blew up the celebrity status, blew up the racial situation.”

*

Garcetti has been in the background recently, leaving the hot seat to prosecutors Hodgman and Clark. But it will be hard for him to avoid the fallout. Abramson, Norris and others will undoubtedly see to that.

He’ll remain what he promised to be in his campaign--a hands-on D.A. or, in the view of critics, a control freak. As such, he’ll reap the rewards or take the heat at the end of O.J. Simpson’s trial.