State Asked to Take Over Probe

The Orange County public defender’s office has asked the state attorney general to take charge of an investigation into allegations of illegal gambling activities by employees of the office, officials confirmed Friday.

Because the public defenders are the regular courtroom adversaries of prosecutors from the Orange County district attorney’s office, Public Defender Carl Holmes believes that local prosecutors have a conflict of interest that should disqualify them from pursuing the investigation.

Although Holmes wants the attorney general’s office to handle the investigation, Senior Assistant Atty. Gen. Gary W. Schons said it is unlikely the state will intervene.

“What’s significant is . . . that the conduct that is alleged is not really part of the public defender’s operation,” Schons said. “You are talking about things individuals might have done that are extracurricular. It is not closely connected to the function of the office and the adversary process.”

Schons said the district attorney’s office contacted state officials early this week to give them details about the scope of the investigation.

“Based on the information we received, we told them we felt they could proceed,” Schons said. “There’s no suggestion, at least so far, that the district attorney will be searching [the] public defender’s office as far as looking into records that could [jeopardize] the confidentiality of attorney-client privilege.”

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The investigation stems from allegations made last year by 47-year-old Teri Ortal, a former investigator for the public defender’s office who was fired in 1996 and is suing for wrongful termination.

Ortal said she was terminated after she notified her supervisors about alleged bookmaking and inflated caseload statistics. She alleges that two investigators collected bets ranging from $5 to $1,000 from as many as 20 employees in the office. She said they used county telephones, fax machines and cars to conduct the activity.

In a lawsuit filed last month in Orange County Superior Court, Ortal said the alleged activities were “hampering the effectiveness of the office” and impairing her ability to do her job.

But Ortal was characterized by Holmes this week as a disgruntled former employee. Her former superiors maintain that she was fired for using up to 30 hours a week of county time to operate a real estate computer software company. She was fired for purported “gross misuse of county time” and “misuse of county position for personal gain.” Ortal denies the charges.

Maurice Evans, chief assistant district attorney, said this week that he does not see a conflict of interest “at this point.” Evans said the probe is part of a large-scale investigation of the biggest known bookmaking operation in the history of Orange County.

One of 10 suspects arrested last month on charges of bookmaking and illegal wagering was 55-year-old Decourcy Wright Graham, a Corona del Mar man who allegedly accepted bets from two public defender investigators placing wagers on behalf of several co-workers.

Holmes could not be reached for comment Friday. He said this week that he is cooperating with prosecutors investigating the alleged activities and he doubts that the probe will uncover any serious wrongdoing.