Panel Wants to See Hermandad Material

The House Oversight Committee served a subpoena on the Orange County district attorney Thursday in an attempt to halt the return of items taken last month from the offices of Hermandad Mexicana Nacional by investigators probing allegations of voter fraud.

The U.S. House of Representatives committee--asked by defeated Republican incumbent Robert K. Dornan to overturn his loss to Democrat Loretta Sanchez--wants prosecutors to forward items seized in the raid to the House Contested Election Task Force.

Congressional investigators are the latest to join the investigation of allegations that immigrants who attended Hermandad citizenship classes may have voted illegally in the 46th Congressional district election.

Orange County Superior Court Judge William R. Froeberg is expected to rule today on a motion by the Latino advocacy group to get back 15 boxes of items and prevent the district attorney from sharing the contents with Congress.

Assistant Dist. Atty. Wallace J. Wade said his office received the subpoena duces tecum at 2 p.m. Thursday.

Signed by Rep. William M. Thomas (R-Bakersfield) and issued on Wednesday, the subpoena orders Dist. Atty. Michael R. Capizzi to produce for the House Oversight Committee by 5 p.m. March 31, “all property in your possession or control including . . . documents and computer disks and drives” taken from Hermandad’s offices.

Wade said his office is still researching the issue and will seek direction from Froeberg’s decision today. He said the district attorney’s office will oppose Hermandad’s request.

“Our position on the [Hermandad] motion is to deny it because the search warrant was perfectly proper,” Wade said. “If the judge agrees, it moots the congressional issue because the [Hermandad] motion is to prevent us from sharing the information with Congress.”

So if the judge denies Hermandad’s motion, Wade said, it appears that “nothing would prevent us from sharing it with Congress.”

Mark S. Rosen, the Hermandad attorney who filed the motion, did not return calls for comment.

Secretary of State Bill Jones also opposes Hermandad’s motion. The state argues in a brief filed with the court that the motion is “legally baseless” and should also be denied because Hermandad “repeatedly” has been offered the opportunity to copy items that were taken.

“The hearing . . . is really almost moot because the Congress does have supremacy over the Superior Court,” said Alfie Charles, a spokesman for Jones.

“Even if the judge ruled in favor of Hermandad’s motion, we would still need to comply with the federal or congressional inquiry,” Charles continued.

Early on Jan. 14, investigators served a search warrant on Hermandad’s Santa Ana offices and began tagging and removing membership and client lists, accounting records, and “ongoing citizenship application” files, Hermandad stated in court papers.

Claiming that its membership and client lists are protected by the 1st Amendment, the group acknowledged in its motion that it “has become a controversial organization.”

“The prospect that affiliation with Hermandad will become known to the District Attorney may well be sufficient to scare people away from Hermandad,” according to the motion.

“People joined Hermandad or sought out its services on the assumption that there would be privacy. The strong-arm tactic of seizing the records will destroy that privacy if allowed to stand,” the motion states.

The subpoena is the first official action by the House panel appointed to hear Dornan’s charges of fraud, and it apparently caught Sanchez (D-Garden Grove) off guard on Thursday.

Sanchez’s chief of staff, Steven Jost, said they had not received a copy of the subpoena even though the committee rules require Republicans to advise Democrats when subpoenas are issued.

“The Democrats are concerned with this process; that they didn’t have an opportunity to see this subpoena before it went out, and [still] have not seen it a day later,” Jost said.

The election task force is scheduled to hold its first official meeting the week of Feb. 24. At that time, the two Republicans and one Democrat on the panel will consider Sanchez’s motion to throw out Dornan’s request that a new election be held.

Sanchez has asked the task force to meet in Orange County and receive testimony from Orange County Registrar of Voters Rosalyn Lever on her own findings, which failed to substantiate Dornan’s complaint.