Lungren Assailed for Bid to Scrap Liability Law

The state’s top prosecutors are tangling with Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren over his support for a bill that would weaken California’s corporate liability law.

The legislation, a key piece of the pro-business agenda that Assembly Republicans pushed through the lower house last week, would show leniency to corporate managers who ignore hazards that kill and maim workers.

California’s district attorneys oppose the bill and are angry with a Jan. 30 letter of support Lungren’s office sent to Assemblyman Charles Poochigian (R-Fresno), who is carrying the measure.

In the letter, Assistant Atty. Gen. Jack R. Stevens warned of the potential for misusing the current law.

“While prosecutorial abuse of the [current] statute may not yet have occurred,” Stevens wrote, “this drastic expansion of the criminal sanction has the potential for future ‘horror stories’ and may already have clouded California’s economic climate.

“We share your conviction that the time is apt to peel back the state’s corporate liability statute,” said Stevens, adding that he was unaware of similar laws anywhere else in the nation.

In a strongly worded response Friday, Gregory D. Totten, executive director of the California District Attorneys Assn., said the attorney general’s position offended prosecutors.

In the letter, a copy of which was obtained by The Times, Totten said: “[Lungren’s position] demeans the integrity of prosecutors throughout the state, demonstrates a misunderstanding of what this law does and its use, and, unfortunately reflects a fundamental breakdown of communications between your office and district attorneys at a time when we should be working closely together.”

While Lungren’s office cited the potential for “horror stories,” Totten said there was “not a single instance suggesting this has occurred in the five years since the statute was originally enacted.”

In an interview Wednesday, Lungren cited the law’s potential for having “a chilling effect on business.” Lungren said he is open to negotiating a compromise and has no problem with corporate liability “where there is willful misconduct.”

Lungren also downplayed the spat, saying that he and the prosecutors agree on almost all issues. Asked if he was surprised by the tough-worded letter from Totten, Lungren said: “There’s a level of civility I’ve attempted to interject into politics and governance in Sacramento and obviously I have a little more work to do.”

Although the rift is rare, it comes on the heels of a consumer fraud controversy last year in which prosecutors also criticized Lungren’s office over the issue of how computer manufacturers advertised the size of computer screens. Prosecutors complained that Lungren deliberately intervened to try to go easy on the industry giants and their powerful lawyers.

Moreover, the liability dispute suggests that Lungren, who is expected to be a GOP candidate for governor in 1998, may be willing to risk losing support among some of his key law enforcement boosters while shoring up his credentials with the business community.

Central to the disagreement is the effectiveness of the 6-year-old Corporate Criminal Liability Act, signed into law by former Gov. George Deukmejian, a longtime Lungren ally.

In 1992, Gov. Pete Wilson’s competitiveness council called for the law’s repeal, saying it provides an “all too-tempting” invitation to publicity-seeking prosecutors and serves as an “unnecessary threat to those who would otherwise seek to create jobs in California.”

Supporters of the Poochigian bill (AB 675) contend that the current law is so vague it is difficult for businesses to determine how to comply.

Stevens, the attorney general’s official, said it is conceivable “that corporate managers could be prosecuted under this statute even where they are unaware that a violation has occurred.”

But prosecutors say the law has been employed in only a handful of cases in which employees were killed or seriously injured.

Jim Provenza, a lobbyist for Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti, favors the current law, saying it “has served as a strong deterrent to the minority of businesses who would otherwise fail to warn workers of conditions which are a threat to their lives and safety.”

James Fox, San Mateo County district attorney and president of the prosecutors group, said the law has been working. “We don’t believe that there’s been any [evidence] showing why it should be changed.”

The Poochigian bill was approved by a 41-38 margin, with all GOP lawmakers lined up behind the measure. It is now in the Democratic-controlled Senate where its fate is unclear.