O.C. Record on Crime Doesn’t Fit the Image

Despite a law-and-order image and one of the most costly criminal justice systems in California, Orange County police and prosecutors have the poorest record for securing felony convictions among the state’s most populated counties, a computer-assisted investigation by The Times has shown.

In cases where authorities decide to prosecute, people arrested for felonies in Orange County have had the lowest chance of facing felony charges in court, of being convicted of felonies, and of getting state prison sentences, which are invariably longer and served under harsher conditions than terms in County Jail.

Orange County law enforcement, which includes 22 police agencies, the Sheriff’s Department and the district attorney’s office, compiled the comparatively low standing while violent crime increased significantly and annual criminal justice spending went up by almost 50% to $759 million for the years The Times studied.

In some cases, local police and prosecutors were dramatically outperformed by their counterparts in other counties, including those such as Santa Clara County that spent about the same amount of money or less per capita for public safety. Santa Clara, which surrounds San Jose, had the same violent crime rate as Orange County and less overall crime, but convicted significantly more people of felonies from 1988 to 1992.

Compared to San Diego County, Orange County had fewer citizens to protect and 22% less crime, but spent at least $90 million or 16.1% a year more on its criminal justice system. Yet San Diego County authorities managed to convict roughly twice the number of felons.

The other counties studied were Los Angeles and San Bernardino. Both have serious crime problems. In Los Angeles, the state’s most populous county, more than 60% of felony arrests--well above Orange County--resulted in felony charges. Of the five counties, the highest percentage of people charged were sent to prison in Los Angeles.

Outside Los Angeles, Orange County has traditionally spent the most for police, prosecutors, courts and jails of the five counties, state criminal justice records show.

“I look at these numbers and it makes me ask what we can do as a police department and as a county to improve,” said Orange Police Chief John Robertson, a veteran law enforcement executive. “I thought Orange County’s overall performance would have been comparable to the other areas.”

But hopes for improvement may be clouded by the county’s unprecedented bankruptcy, which has forced cuts in county law enforcement and could impact city police departments if the county succeeds in appropriating municipal revenues.

Bolstering the statistical evidence, a search of Orange County court files turned up thefts, stabbings and beatings that ended up being pursued as misdemeanors, although the facts may have justified more serious felony charges.

In 1992, Kenneth G. Davis, a 47-year-old transient, stabbed Reginald J. Akers in the stomach with a 10-inch knife after a scuffle at the Episcopal Alliance, a church-based charity in Santa Ana. Akers, whose medical bills totaled $29,000, underwent surgery and was hospitalized at taxpayer expense at Western Medical Center in Santa Ana.

Although police had arrested Davis on a felony charge, the district attorney filed a misdemeanor assault case against him. California District Attorney Assn. guidelines state that a felony should be charged in any assault case in which the victim is hospitalized.

The defendant pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault and was sentenced to time already served in jail awaiting trial--five months--and probation. He also was ordered to pay the medical bills, but court records reflect no payments.

Orange County prosecutors said they could not explain why they filed a misdemeanor rather than a felony charge against Davis because their case file has been misplaced.

To compare prosecution records in the five counties, The Times used records that originate in local police departments, and are computerized by the California Department of Justice. The data detailed what happened to almost 900,000 adults arrested for felonies whose cases were resolved between Jan. 1, 1988 and the end of 1992, the latest year for which official data is available.

The Justice Department cautions against comparisons among sparsely populated counties, so The Times used data only from the five most populous counties, of which Orange County ranks third. Some comparisons with statewide data were also made.

Among the findings:

* Felony charges were the least likely to be filed in Orange County against people arrested in the so-called “serious and violent” crimes such as murder, robbery, rape and burglary--crimes now considered “strikes” under a new state law that can put three-time felons behind bars for life without parole. State law defines 29 felonies as “serious and violent.”

* People arrested in Orange County for spousal abuse, auto theft and burglary--some of the most frequently reported crimes--had the greatest chance of avoiding both felony convictions on their records and prison sentences.

* Of the felony arrests that resulted in criminal cases, the majority--55%--ended up being filed by prosecutors as misdemeanors in Orange County. But in the other four counties, as well as statewide, the opposite occurred, with felony charges being filed in 60% of the cases, compared to Orange County’s 45%.

* Because of this lower felony prosecution rate, Orange County sent the smallest percentage of people to prison as a result of all types of felony arrests.

Criminal justice researchers say the felony prosecution record of a county can depend on a host of factors, such as the seriousness of crime, law enforcement resources, the policies of police departments and the district attorney, as well as their working relationships.

Police and prosecutors are heavily dependent on each other for the successful prosecution of criminals. Police and sheriff’s deputies gather evidence of wrongdoing, make arrests and seek criminal complaints. District attorneys evaluate the cases presented to them by police and decide whom to charge and take to court.

Although individual sentences are set by judges, district attorneys also greatly influence the severity of punishment in virtually every case by the type of charges they file.

Felonies are punishable with terms of 16 months or more in state prison, while misdemeanors generally carry maximum penalties of six months in county jail, with some exceptions. So if the district attorney elects to file a misdemeanor charge instead of a felony, he puts a lower ceiling on the punishment the accused faces if found guilty.

“A misdemeanor is appropriate for someone caught spraying graffiti or for riding a bus without paying for a bus token. But it is not a deterrent to violent crime,” said Alice Vachss, a former New York City prosecutor and author of a recent book about sex crimes who reviewed statistical charts developed by The Times.

“It’s a slap on the wrist,” she said. “Felony filings merit an entire range of options and punishments. To opt out of charging a felony eliminates any serious response.”

Commenting on The Times’ findings, some Orange County police chiefs said they were surprised and concerned about the high proportion of felony arrestees being prosecuted on misdemeanor charges, because the criminals are returned to the streets more quickly and the deterrent effect on other would-be criminals is diminished.

Moreover, they said limited law enforcement resources are wasted if misdemeanor charges are the end result of more costly and time-consuming felony investigations. Proving a felony often requires forensic laboratory work, more witness interviews and more court appearances for police officers.

“It looks like there might be something we need to work out,” said Huntington Beach Police Chief Ronald Lowenberg. “Perhaps we have grown too fast as a county, and we’re still trying to control crime like in the 1960s and 1970s. Maybe it needs to change.”

Orange County Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi and Santa Ana Police Chief Paul Walters say it is impossible to compare counties because there are so many variables.

“We’re talking about practices that may vary from one city to another, based upon the policies of the police departments,” Capizzi said. “We are talking about variables of the types of crimes, the criminal backgrounds of those arrested and we’re talking about the different policies of the district attorneys’ offices. I don’t think those statistics, in and of themselves, prove anything.”

Walters, Capizzi and some other local law enforcement officials took issue with the Justice Department data The Times relied upon, arguing that it is incomplete and unreliable.

But an array of experts consulted by The Times, including RAND and the statistics department at UCLA, said the basic data was reliable and the comparisons fair.

Defending Orange County’s record, Capizzi said the relatively low crime rate there--for violent crime in particular--is attributable, in part, to the work of his office and that of other law enforcement officials. Among the five counties studied by The Times, only Santa Clara has lower crime rates.

Of the state’s 10 most populous counties, Capizzi said, Orange County has one of the lowest crime rates, and the second-lowest violent crime rate, a “significant accomplishment . . . due in part to our efforts here in the district attorney’s office.” The overall crime rate also is below the state average.

During the years The Times studied, Orange County slowly but steadily improved its felony prosecution rate, especially for crimes such as auto theft and spousal abuse.

Of all the felony arrest cases that completed their months-long odyssey through the criminal justice system in 1992--Orange County’s best year statistically--53% had been handled by prosecutors as felonies, and 47% as misdemeanors.

Although Capizzi insists that his office has no goals for any type of charge, he acknowledges that he placed greater emphasis on filing felony rather than misdemeanor charges for vehicle thefts and in spousal abuse cases after he was appointed the county’s top prosecutor in January, 1990.

He said the increase in the felony prosecution rate under his stewardship was more likely attributable to the nature of the individual cases police brought to his office “and a sense that the cases . . . [were] more demanding of felony treatment.”

Nevertheless, Orange County’s was still the lowest felony prosecution rate among the five most urbanized counties that year, and the ability to improve in the years ahead is uncertain, given the county’s bankruptcy.

Already, the financial calamity has lopped $2 million from the district attorney’s budget and $4 million from the Sheriff’s Department, the county’s largest law enforcement agency. With the failure of Measure R, the half-cent sales tax defeated by voters in June, even deeper spending cuts could be on the horizon for both agencies, as well as city police departments if the state Legislature diverts some tax revenues to the county.

Capizzi recently announced that his office, which has 20 vacant posts for attorneys, will no longer prosecute many low-level misdemeanor crimes such as trespassing, public disturbances and minor alcohol-related offenses.

But even before the bankruptcy, Orange County’s performance by a variety of measures was low when compared to other counties. For example, only one in nine criminal cases resulting from a felony arrest ended in a prison sentence, and the overall felony conviction rate was the lowest of the five metropolitan regions the Times analyzed.

Similar conclusions were reached in a separate study by Santa Clara County Municipal Court, which used the same Justice Department data to compare the handling of 1992 felony cases in Santa Clara to nine other metropolitan counties. Of the 10 counties, Orange County had the lowest percentage of felony arrests that resulted in felony prosecutions and convictions.

“The reality is, for the exact same crime in another county, you have a much better chance of getting a felony conviction and state prison time,” said Orange County sheriff’s Capt. Jack DeVereaux, a 31-year veteran who teaches new officers about the criminal justice system at the Sheriff’s Academy.

In his training sessions, DeVereaux said, “I tell the new officers, ‘You may think you’re in a law-and-order county, but the statistics show differently.’ The cops are booking the crooks and the D.A. elects to file misdemeanors that further fill up our overcrowded jails.

“I think the D.A. only goes for felonies on the slam-dunk cases here. The ones they have to work for, or think they might lose, they don’t bother with, and they file as misdemeanors.”

Capizzi denies that his office is more selective about the felony cases it files. Prosecutors, he says, try to bring charges that most accurately reflect the crime.

But of the five counties The Times compared, Orange County ranked last in pressing felony charges against persons arrested on suspicion of felony burglary. Santa Clara County prosecutors filed felony charges in 74% of such cases. In San Diego County, that figure was 60%. In Orange County, 31%.

In Los Angeles County, someone arrested for felony burglary and prosecuted has roughly a one in four chance of going to prison. In Orange County, those odds are about one in nine.

Of those arrested for felony auto theft in the five counties, a felony charge was least likely to be filed in Orange County, which also had the lowest felony conviction rate in such cases and tied Santa Clara for sending the smallest percentage to state prison.

Orange County’s record for prosecuting rape and spousal abuse cases was similarly at the bottom of the list, compared to the other four counties. Of those arrested for rape, felony charges resulted in less than 80% of the cases. The other counties filed felonies 90% of the time. One in three arrested in Orange County ended up in prison. In Los Angeles County, the rate was nearly one in two.

In domestic violence cases, only 4% of those arrested for spousal abuse were charged with felonies in Orange County, compared with 21% in Santa Clara County, 17% in San Diego County and 14% in San Bernardino County. Only 2.3% were convicted of that offense in Orange County and less than 1% went to prison.

Aside from the issue of questionable filings, a 1994 internal study by Capizzi’s office noted that proportionately more of Orange County’s felony cases were being reduced to misdemeanors or dismissed in court than in nine other metropolitan counties in California. The report was based on the same Justice Department data used by The Times.

Many high-ranking police officials, mindful of their need to maintain good relations with Capizzi’s office, were reluctant to criticize the district attorney when contacted by The Times. Yet some said privately that Capizzi’s prosecutors and investigators do the minimum in order to just get by.

“They work hard to file felonies only on those cases they think they can win--the dead-bang cases,” said one high-ranking police administrator who spoke on the condition that he not be named. “It’s an embarrassment for [Capizzi] to say how tough on crime he is, and then you look at his statistics.”

After The Times shared its findings with Capizzi, his office in January began keeping special track of felony case activity at the county’s five courthouses. Brent Romney, one of Capizzi’s chief assistants, said that during the first six months of this year, prosecutors filed felony charges almost 90% of the time police requested them.

The Times study indicates that Orange County police typically make 2,000 felony arrests per month. If the district attorney in the first six months of this year charged only 1,000 a month with felonies, as Romney reports, the implication is that police are over-charging at the time of arrest, and are downgrading charges more often than prosecutors.

“If our figures are correct, it shows that the police exercise their discretion to a substantial degree in what happens to felony arrests,” Romney said. “If they are not correct, the police exercise their discretion to a lesser degree. I don’t think our figures are wrong.”

Members of county law enforcement and the legal community say the police share some responsibility for the county’s low felony prosecution rate. The quality of police investigative work, they contend, sometimes leaves much to be desired, and some Orange County police departments often seek felony charges where the facts point to a misdemeanor.

“I am opposed to a D.A. that files a lot of low-end felony cases to . . . look good. You don’t want the court awash in weak cases. You don’t want to burden your felony [prosecutors] with minor cases,” said Orange County Municipal Judge Pamela L. Iles in Laguna Niguel. “I think they screen carefully, and exercise good discretion.”

But Lt. Jim Weuve, a 23-year veteran of the Cypress Police Department, said police are obliged to follow state law when it comes to making an arrest--even though prosecutors have declined to file felony charges in seven of 10 felony arrest cases in his city.

“People consider this a conservative county,” said Weuve. “But it’s not as conservative as people believe. People think it’s law-and-order, and if you break the law, you get hung by the neck. That just isn’t true.”

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County Comparison

Here, by county, is how suspects arrested for felonies were dealt with from 1988 to 1992.

Los San Santa San Angeles Diego Orange Clara Bernardino Charged with felonies 62% 63% 45% 73% 53% Convicted of felonies 53% 53% 37% 56% 40% Imprisoned 21% 14% 11% 12% 16%

5-county average Charged with felonies 60% Convicted of felonies 50% Imprisoned 17%

Source: California Department of Justice

Researched by MARK LANDSBAUM and DAN WEIKEL / Los Angeles Times

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Serious Felonies

During the period 1988-92, Orange County had less success convicting and imprisoning defendants arrested for the most serious and violent felonies than the four other largest counties in the state. Percentages based on total complaints filed against defendants whom police asked the district attorney to prosecute:

Los San Santa San Angeles Diego Orange Clara Bernardino Charged with felonies 67% 77% 57% 81% 68% Convicted of felonies 55% 64% 46% 65% 51% Prison 32% 26% 22% 27% 29%

5-county average Charged with felonies 68% Convicted of felonies 55% Prison 30%

Note: California law defines 28 crimes as the most serious and violent. Ranging from murder, forcible rape and residential burglary to continuous sexual abuse of a child, they are the “three strike” crimes.

Source: California Department of Justice

Researched by DAN WEIKEL and MARK LANDSBAUM / Los Angeles Times