Fiery Debates Retain Focus on Simpson

Challenger John Lynch charges that Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti is more interested in appearing on the evening newscast than in winning big cases.

Garcetti says Lynch is a bureaucrat who has no innovative ideas to prevent crime and who “has demagogued the one issue he continues to bring up”--the failed prosecution of the O.J. Simpson murder trial.

With election day approaching, Garcetti and Lynch sparred yet again Saturday over the issues that have dominated their increasingly combative race--the incumbent’s record and the Simpson case.

In the fifth of a series of debates that have served as checkpoints through the long election season Lynch asserted Saturday that deputies in the office are “embarrassed by the image that they are a group of people who fall apart and do bad things in major cases--and I think it’s a result of the fascination of the present leadership with prosecution by press conference.”

Speaking to a crowd of about 50 people at the Inglewood High School cafeteria, Garcetti responded: “My opponent truly has been a Johnny One-Note candidate. He wants to talk about one case, repeatedly talk about one case. . . . In 10 months he has still not offered one positive idea or program about how . . . he would make this community safer.”

Expect to see such sentiments expressed again by both men as Nov. 5 draws closer and TV ads begin to air, for the debates have helped sharpen and focus their respective attacks.

The debates, which began in July, have also been just as noteworthy for the emergence of each man’s personal style.

Garcetti, who can come off as cold and calculating, has warmed up. In recent weeks, he has laughed and smiled with a humanity that his longtime friends say is the real thing. On Saturday, he gave his closing statement while walking in front of the lectern--in the manner of a talk show host chumming with a group of pals.

As the weeks have passed, Garcetti also has appeared more confident and become far more aggressive in defense of his own record and in his attacks on Lynch. Besides “Johnny One-Note,” he has also called Lynch a “Maytag Man,” suggesting that the challenger would simply wait for police to call with the next case rather than use the district attorney’s bully pulpit to try to prevent crime.

Lynch has also been assertive. A few weeks back, when Garcetti first labeled him “Johnny One-Note,” Lynch responded by comparing Garcetti to the captain of the Titanic.

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Lynch, the head deputy of the Norwalk branch who is running his first political campaign, has consistently shown a quick wit. On Saturday, in response to one of several questions from the predominantly black audience about whether minority defendants get treated differently in the courts than whites, Lynch noted in an easy tone, “The two people that are running for district attorney look like two guys that fell off the back of an FBI truck.”

The audience laughed.

The first debate was held July 9. Because there was so little media coverage of an event so many months before November, both candidates used the occasion to try out sound bites for fit and feel.

Speaking of the Simpson case, for instance, Garcetti asserted: “We convinced about 80% of the people as to the guilt of the defendant but we did not convince the 12,” meaning the 12 jurors.

Lynch ridiculed that assertion, saying he believed the only opinions that mattered were those of the 12 jurors. Garcetti has not used the line since. His comment about the case has now evolved to: “We gave it our best shot.”

By the second debate, Aug. 27 at a Van Nuys hotel, Garcetti clearly had been working on the encompassing themes he was lacking the first time out--talking points he now hits at every campaign stop. He asserted that being D.A. is “much more than any one case”--involving not just the prosecution but the prevention of crime.

Lynch has consistently said that the prosecution of “predatory street crime” is the office’s No. 1 priority, and Garcetti seized on that view to paint Lynch as a visionless bureaucrat who would simply wait for the phone to ring.

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By contrast, Garcetti said he had developed a variety of crime-prevention initiatives--such as an anti-truancy program designed to keep children in school.

That night in Van Nuys, Lynch said such programs were “at the margins” of the district attorney’s job. He has since said he would have phrased it differently and has no great objection to such initiatives, if cost effective--but he repeated the point that prosecution of street crime is indeed his primary priority.

That second debate set a pattern for the third and fourth--the third Sept. 9 at the Hall of Administration, the fourth last Thursday.

At the debate Saturday, sponsored by the Coalition of African American Law Enforcement Assns., the pattern proved somewhat different--with questions from the audience, for instance, about the possibility of CIA involvement in the crack cocaine epidemic. Both candidates urged a full investigation.

Yet at the end, Lynch turned the focus back to the Simpson case.

After saying he would not refer to “that case,” Lynch asked this rhetorical question: “If a major crime occurred today in Los Angeles and one Johnnie L. Cochran Jr. stood up against the district attorney’s office, and you had to bet your $5, which way would you bet?”

In response, Garcetti again asked voters to look at his entire record. His office has prosecuted more than 350,000 felony cases during his term, Garcetti said.

“We are seeking justice every day,” as well as trying to prevent crime, Garcetti said. “I’m not a social worker. I know what I am. But we can prevent some crimes if we’re willing to get off our rear ends and work.”

A sixth debate is scheduled for Oct. 16. It remains uncertain whether there will be others.