Wide Array of Political Figures Seek Leniency for Arthur Snyder

Under any other circumstances, this would be a coalition to die for.

Some of California’s most recognizable politicos, from San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown on the left to Orange County Rep. Dana Rohrabacher on the right, have written letters with a single purpose: to keep former Los Angeles city councilman and campaign fund-raising wizard Arthur K. Snyder out of jail.

The letters, among about 220 written on Snyder’s behalf to Superior Court Judge John W. Ouderkirk, are included in documents filed late Tuesday in connection with Snyder’s upcoming sentencing on money-laundering charges.

Snyder was one of the most potent--and colorful--City Hall insiders for three decades before getting snared in a high-profile political corruption case. He pleaded guilty in September to misdemeanor conspiracy and money-laundering charges--attempts to hide the true source of campaign contributions. The negotiated settlement helped Snyder avoid the felony conviction prosecutors had been seeking, but he still faces possible jail time and other punishment.

The attorney-lobbyist and 18-year councilman from the Eastside suffered a heart attack Sunday while vacationing in the Sierra Nevada with friends on his 64th birthday, and remained in serious condition Tuesday in a Reno hospital. His sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 22, and his attorney, Mark Geragos, said it is too soon to decide whether to seek a postponement because of Snyder’s illness, the latest in a series of medical problems.

The signatures on the letters, compiled before Snyder was stricken over the weekend, read like a blue book of California elected officials: Los Angeles County Supervisor (and newly dubbed county mayor) Mike Antonovich; Supervisor and former City Councilman Zev Yaroslavsky; longtime area Democratic Reps. Edward Roybal, Esteban Torres and Maxine Waters; retired county Supervisor and Councilman Kenneth Hahn, and former City Atty. Burt Pines.

One-third of the 15-member City Council--John Ferraro, Hal Bernson, Mike Hernandez, Richard Alatorre and Joel Wachs--wrote seeking mercy for Snyder. So did several former council members who had been Snyder’s colleagues--Joy Picus, Robert Farrell, Joan Milke Flores and Bob Ronka. So did scores of lobbyists, campaign consultants, former and present city employees, community activists and consultants from across Los Angeles’ diverse political spectrum.

Snyder is seeking community service as an alternative to jail time, and many letters urged the judge to choose that alternative. Two community organization leaders--Father Gregory Boyle of the Dolores Mission in Boyle Heights, often lauded for his work with gang members, and the Rev. Gene Boutilier of the United Church of Christ, director of El Rescate Legal Services--said in court documents that they would welcome help from Snyder.

“This is a brave man, a man of honor and principle, commitment, care, understanding, loyalty and love,” wrote Father Juan Santillan, the activist pastor at Our Lady Help of Christians Roman Catholic Church in Lincoln Heights and a city recreation and parks commissioner.

Others talked about Snyder’s skills as a legislator, his tenacity in getting facilities and services for his constituents and the long hours he put in. Most addressed only obliquely the activities that had landed Snyder in trouble, and said his transgressions should be weighed against all he had accomplished in office.

“While I did not always agree with him on matters of policy, I respected his intellect, his dedication to his constituents and love for the City of Los Angeles and for the City Council as an institution,” wrote former colleague Yaroslavsky, adding, “I believe Art Snyder has suffered tremendously” during the long investigation and prosecution.

The documents also traced a life of contrasts, with proud achievements and hard-fought accomplishments alternating with accounts of broken marriages and messy divorces.

Snyder himself, always among the most dramatically articulate of the council members, bared for the court the most intimate details of his humiliating fall from power, including the ruins of his once-lucrative law/lobbying practice and the ravages of medical problems--high blood pressure, a pre-diabetic condition and surgeries for prostate cancer.

“So I have been alone for the past two years, more and more reclusive, with the stress multiplying, and my body has started to give up,” Snyder wrote.

“Prostate cancer, triggered by stress, required that I undergo radical prostatectomy, with three clean-up operations, all in 1995,” he continued. “So I wear a diaper every day and suffer the other malfunctions related to that surgery.”

Ouderkirk could sentence Snyder to up to five years in jail, ban him from lobbying and impose fines of as much as $200,000. Prosecutors, in a court document filed Oct. 31, are seeking a one-year jail term and an $81,000 fine.