Capizzi Target of Conservative Fire for Probes : Politics: State GOP official says Republican D.A. is trying to blur his own role in bankruptcy with unwarranted investigations.

A leader of the state Republican Party’s conservative wing attacked Orange County Dist. Atty. and fellow GOP member Michael R. Capizzi Tuesday, calling recent investigations of Assembly candidates “smoke and mirrors to distract attention from Capizzi’s office’s failure to do its job in relation to the bankruptcy.”

Michael Schroeder, vice chairman of the state party and a co-chairman of the organization that led the successful recall campaign against Assemblywoman Doris Allen (R-Cypress), called the investigations “hypocrisy” and an effort to “criminalize small mistakes and paperwork violations.”

Schroeder said the investigations of the links between short-lived Democratic candidate Laurie Campbell and Republican Scott Baugh, who was elected last month to succeed Allen in the 67th Assembly District seat, as well as civil accusations filed against Supervisors Roger R. Stanton and William G. Steiner, are part of an effort by Capizzi to “cover his own political rear end.”

Campbell, who filed as a Democrat, was thrown off the ballot after a judge determined she filed falsified nominating petitions. Democrats have accused Republican officials of fostering her candidacy to siphon votes away from a more established Democratic candidate.

Republicans have previously denied the charge, but Assembly GOP Leader Curt Pringle acknowledged Tuesday that one of his aides was involved in circulating the petitions for Campbell.

Capizzi called the charges and a simultaneous formal complaint filed with his office “the smoke screen and the flash-bang grenades” typically used “to divert attention from the focal point” of an investigation.

He said he would not “recuse” himself from the Campbell and Baugh investigations, as Schroeder requested. Instead, he challenged Schroeder to file the complaint against him with the state attorney general.

“If they had any sincerity in their complaint, they would have referred it themselves to the attorney general’s office,” he said. “That is where any complaint against me belongs.”

Mark Bucher, a volunteer in the Baugh campaign, filed the formal complaint with the district attorney’s office Tuesday. The letter from Bucher, who lives in Tustin, asked that the district attorney start a criminal investigation into alleged errors made on nomination papers filed on behalf of Capizzi in his 1990 and 1994 election campaigns.

After circulating copies of Capizzi’s nominating papers, Schroeder also called on the district attorney to refer the Campbell and Baugh probes and the complaint against Capizzi to a third party, possibly state Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren. Schroeder said Capizzi “cannot be fair and open-minded” about the issue.

Schroeder and Bucher were joined at the news conference by Jim Righeimer, the campaign chairman for Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Huntington Beach), who supported the effort to challenge the investigations into the Campbell candidacy and financial irregularities in the Baugh campaign.

Capizzi rejected claims that his petitions contained significant errors, or that he or others who circulated his papers did not witness the signatures on them.

“If I signed one, I witnessed the signatures,” Capizzi said.

Schroeder also alleged that the papers are filled out in different handwriting and contain the same technical violations alleged against Campbell.

“The handwritings are not even remotely similar. . . . There is no way he collected those signatures himself,” Schroeder said.

Election law requires that the person circulating a nominating petition supply certain information and sign the papers declaring he or she witnessed all signatures. A Sacramento Superior Court judge ordered Campbell removed from the Nov. 28 ballot after concluding she did not personally circulate her petitions, though Campbell swore she had.

Though he did not refute the claim by Schroeder about the apparent handwriting discrepancies on some of the filings, Capizzi said, “All the information called for is provided and it certainly meets the spirit and intent of the law. Everything is there and it is accurate.”

In addition to investigating possible ties between the Campbell candidacy and Baugh, the district attorney’s office is trying to determine if Baugh deliberately failed to report a contribution of $1,000 from the Campbells to avoid being linked to the alleged Republican effort to place her on the ballot.

Capizzi’s critics said they are also reviewing the district attorney’s campaign finance reports to determine if there are finance violations similar to those found on Baugh’s records, sources said.