Panel May Recommend No Prison for Citron : Bankruptcy: But former O.C. treasurer’s lawyer tells judge prosecutor will fight probation department decision.

A probation department report will recommend that former Orange County Treasurer Robert L. Citron be spared a term in state prison for his six felony convictions and be sentenced to a year or less in county jail and probation, Superior Court Judge David O. Carter was told Monday.

But Citron’s attorney, David W. Wiechert, informed the judge at a hastily called hearing Monday that the district attorney’s office plans to argue that Citron should spend some time in state prison.

Wiechert, who contends that the former treasurer, 70, should not spend time in either jail or prison, told the court he learned of the sentencing recommendation in a telephone conversation with the San Diego County probation officer preparing the report.

The judge, who had prodded both sides to be ready for sentencing Dec. 29, also agreed at the same hearing to postpone Citron’s sentencing until Feb. 23, so that his attorney would have time to examine prosecutors’ evidence against others implicated in the collapse of the county-run investment pool.

Carter called the hearing Monday, apparently after deciding to reverse the position he took Friday. He had ruled then that prosecutors did not have to show Citron’s attorney the evidence they had against Ronald S. Rubino, the former county budget director indicted last week on two felony counts of aiding and abetting Citron in the skimming of $60 million in interest from county pool investors.

To give Citron ample time to evaluate this recently gathered evidence, Carter rescheduled the sentencing.

Carter also granted a Citron motion that the county’s unprecedented bankruptcy should not be considered at sentencing, because the crimes to which the former treasurer pleaded guilty did not cause the bankruptcy.

“Today was an important step in the achievement of a fair sentencing hearing for Mr. Citron,” Wiechert said in an interview. “Not only will we be able to obtain discovery with regard to Mr. Rubino, but the court recognizes that this is a case involving crimes that did not cause the bankruptcy.”

Although he did not remove himself from the case, Carter told the two sides Monday that he may have a potential conflict of interest because Rubino’s wife, Sharon Esterley, worked on Carter’s campaign when he ran unsuccessfully against Rep. Robert Dornan (R-Garden Grove) in 1986.

The judge also disclosed that at the couple’s request he performed the wedding ceremony when Rubino married Esterley, a former spokeswoman for John Wayne Airport, and had dinner with them about three years ago. Wiechert said he did not know whether he will file a motion to have Carter disqualified from sentencing Citron.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Matthew Anderson said Carter indicated that he did not feel a need to recuse himself. Anderson said Carter made the same disclosures to the grand jury before it indicted Rubino.

The prosecutor said Carter postponed the sentencing because he concluded that “Mr. Citron and Mr. Wiechert were entitled to the materials relating to Ron Rubino.”

Anderson said the judge reversed himself, indicating that “he had a better understanding that there was close relationship” between the accusations against both Citron and Rubino, who were both accused of skimming interest from the pool into a county account.

Anderson said Wiechert raised the matter of the sentencing recommendation and, “speaking out of school,” also contended that the district attorney was set on recommending prison. But Anderson denied that any such decision had been made.