Homeless Defense Dealt Blow

A Municipal Court judge ruled Tuesday that Pastor Wiley S. Drake may not use the broad defense that he violated city laws to house the homeless because they were in immediate danger.

But Judge Gregg L. Prickett left the door open for Drake’s attorney to argue that a handful of the homeless who camped on church grounds last year, such as a pregnant woman and a dying man, faced emergencies.

Prickett is presiding over Drake’s trial on five misdemeanors related to housing homeless people at the First Southern Baptist Church of Buena Park.

The judge said Drake could testify that he felt impelled to aid the destitute as a religious mission.

The ruling came after an hour of argument between defense attorney Jon Alexander and assistant city prosecutor Gregory P. Palmer and touched on the broader implications of the case.

Alexander said the dangers and violence of life on the street or in impromptu camps constituted an “imminent and significant evil” that Drake was justified in preventing.

“What are their alternatives?” Alexander said. “The camps--camps fraught with illness, disease, violence, sexual assaults and none of the benefits conferred by the . . . church.”

Palmer argued that the only “necessity” Drake faced was the political one of jumping on the homeless advocacy bandwagon.

“He’s talking about emergency shelter, and he should not get away with it,” Palmer said, adding that Drake had rejected legal means to establish a shelter and aid the homeless.

“A trial should not be a cause,” Palmer added. Should the court allow the “necessity defense,” then homeless people would be justified in all sorts of crimes, such as theft and breaking and entering, he said.