Judge Postpones Sentencing for Former City Councilman Snyder

Seated in a wheelchair and tethered to an oxygen tank, former Los Angeles Councilman and powerhouse lobbyist Arthur K. Snyder, just one week after quadruple-bypass heart surgery, came to court Friday for his scheduled sentencing on criminal campaign money laundering charges.

Snyder, surrounded by family, friends and longtime constituents, greeted his attorney by opening his shirt to reveal the new chest scar, then sat hunched in his wheelchair, occasionally grimacing and coughing gingerly, through nearly three hours of proceedings. In the end, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge John Ouderkirk decided to postpone sentencing until Dec. 20 so he could get a better idea of Snyder’s medical prognosis.

“I wanted to put this behind me . . . this is killing me,” Snyder said after court, his once-booming orator’s voice reduced to a raspy near-whisper.

The former official, who pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges in September and faces possible jail time, fines and loss of his lawyer’s license, had a heart attack Nov. 10--his 64th birthday--and underwent heart surgery several days later. He also suffers from prostate cancer and high blood pressure, conditions his attorney said have been exacerbated by the stress of the long, highly publicized case.

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The postponement did not keep the Snyder case from becoming the other courtroom drama of the day. While O.J. Simpson was transfixing a Santa Monica courtroom with his long-awaited testimony, Snyder was in the Criminal Courts Building in downtown Los Angeles, hearing the state’s leading anti-political corruption advocate testify about the seriousness of his conduct.

Robert M. Stern, who helped write the California Political Reform Act of 1974, under which Snyder was prosecuted, said he had never seen such an “extensive, invasive and sophisticated” system for hiding the true source of political campaign contributions, involving hundreds of alleged donors--many of them recent immigrants, friends, family members or others not likely or able to give $500 to $1,000.

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Deputy Dist. Attys. Daniel Nixon and Randall Baron persevered in continuing to seek time in custody for Snyder, even if not in County Jail. In their sentencing memo, the prosecutors had sought a year in jail and an $81,000 fine for Snyder, but on Friday suggested that they would settle for something outside of jail if Snyder’s health precludes a tougher sentence.

And Snyder’s attorney, Mark Geragos, renewed his pleas for mercy in the form of a sentence of community service. He said Snyder has suffered a dramatic decline in health since the case began and could very well lose his license to practice law.

“He is looking for some kind of closure” and a way to “salvage . . . what little he has left,” Geragos said.