SHERMAN OAKS : Garcetti to Address Homeowner Meeting

Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti will be a guest at the monthly meeting of the Sherman Oaks Homeowners Assn. on Wednesday.

Association President Richard Close said he is “pleased and surprised” that Garcetti agreed to come to the meeting, noting that it had been more than a year since the county’s top prosecutor spoke to the group.

More than 100 people attended Garcetti’s appearance before the association in October, 1993, which occurred on the day the verdict in the Reginald Denny assault case was handed down.

Garcetti will be available to answer questions about the highly publicized cases his office is currently handling, including the O. J. Simpson and Menendez brothers murder trials.

But Close, for one, hopes the questions will be more wide-ranging. “Most people only think of the D.A. in terms of the high-profile cases, but more important to fighting crime in our community is what is happening on the 320,000 other cases,” Close said.

Other issues that the district attorney’s office is grappling with is the impact of the so-called “three strikes” law on the already overloaded criminal-justice system, the shortage of jail space and prosecutors’ ability to crack down on crime in a time of shrinking budgets.

The meeting is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. in the Dixie Canyon Avenue Elementary School auditorium, 4220 Dixie Canyon Ave., Sherman Oaks. It is free and open to the public.