Wise Decisions From O.C.’s Prudent Jurists : * Moves Dispel Taint of Conflict in Bankruptcy Cases

Orange County Superior Court Judge Theodore E. Millard made the right call when he decided to have a judge from outside the county hear charges against two supervisors and the auditor-controller.

There is no reason to believe that Orange County judges would have been unfair in handling the cases of Supervisors Roger R. Stanton and William G. Steiner and Auditor-Controller Steve E. Lewis. But appearances are important, especially when it comes to the judiciary, which has enormous power. And the current cases do allow at least the appearance of conflict of interest.

County judges depend on the Board of Supervisors to authorize the money that keeps courtrooms open. If the supervisors provide less than the judges would like, which is what usually happens, there can be bad feelings.

Yet there is no reason to believe the judges would be anything other than impartial in handling a case involving a supervisor. The judges are professionals, bound by a canon of ethics and carefully scrutinized by the lawyers appearing before them.

Still, Millard, as presiding judge of the Superior Court, struck the right note in disqualifying his local colleagues from handling the cases of Stanton, Steiner and Lewis. The Orange County Grand Jury accused the three men of civil misconduct for allegedly failing to monitor the investments that went bad and brought bankruptcy on the county.

Millard said the supervisors deal with court funding, while Lewis and his subordinates made daily decisions on the court’s budget and payment of court employees. Those issues “create the appearance of a conflict” serious enough to warrant disqualification, the judge said.

Millard asked California’s chief justice, Malcolm Lucas, to appoint an outside judge to hear the case. To his credit, Lucas took action the next day, appointing Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge John W. Ouderkirk to preside. Ouderkirk held his first hearing in the matter last Monday.

Two days after Millard’s decision, Superior Court Judge David O. Carter wisely bowed out of another bankruptcy-related case. Carter was scheduled to impose sentence on Robert L. Citron, the former treasurer-tax collector whose bad investments led to bankruptcy, the investments Steiner, Stanton and Lewis allegedly did not oversee. Carter did not cite specifics in his decision to step down, saying only that he had “potential conflicts” in the case. Given the extraordinarily high profile of the case and the importance of the dealings that spawned it, Carter was right not to risk second-guessing and possible reversal of his actions.

Carter earlier had declined to handle the case of former county Budget Director Ronald S. Rubino because he had officiated at Rubino’s wedding and Rubino’s wife worked on the judge’s unsuccessful campaign for Congress several years ago. That is the sort of conflict that judges often cite in disqualifying themselves from a case. At other times, a jurist may announce the appearance of a conflict; if both sides agree, the judge can remain.

The litigation surrounding the bankruptcy has been far-reaching and complex, involving civil charges and criminal allegations. It has generated much interest, understandably. The public benefits from assurances that all the cases are being handled fairly, with no conflicts of interest.