Judge Won’t Take Himself Off Trial

Without explaining why, a Ventura County judge declined Friday to remove himself from hearing the fraud trial of a Sherman Oaks consultant who allegedly plotted to blow up the county courthouse and kill as many judges and prosecutors as he could.

Superior Court Judge Vincent J. O’Neill then proceeded with the fraud case, refusing to set any bail that would allow Frank Boyd Cockrell II to walk out the door, pending trial.

O’Neill had been pondering for two weeks whether it would be a conflict of interest for him to sit in a courthouse allegedly targeted for bombing and hear charges against the man accused of plotting the attack.

He sought advice from other Ventura County Superior Court judges and from counselors outside the courthouse.

But when O’Neill made his ruling, he issued no written opinion and offered no verbal explanation.

He said only, “At this time, the court is declining to step out of the case, due to the new case that’s arisen in Los Angeles County” over the alleged bomb plot.

Meanwhile, Cockrell filed the latest in a series of motions asking that a higher court remove O’Neill, Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury and the entire district attorney’s staff from the case. The previous motions accused O’Neill and Bradbury of bias against Cockrell; the motions filed Friday were not available from the court clerk’s office.

Cockrell’s attorney, Edward Whipple, and Deputy Dist. Atty. Mark Aveis declined to comment on the judge’s decision or on the motions, which are to be argued orally Oct. 31.

Cockrell and four other people stand accused of swindling investors who believed they were buying stock in a company that sold surety bonds to minority building contractors involved with the 1996 Olympic Games in Atlanta.

But last month the fraud case took a strange turn when an agent from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms alleged that Cockrell tried to hire him to destroy the courthouse with a truck bomb, in order to eliminate all the evidence against him.

Agent Charles M. Pratt testified that Cockrell paid him $2,000 to kidnap, rob and murder a Sherman Oaks car dealer and his wife to help finance a larger campaign of terror. This was to include robberies, the arson of a Ventura refinery and rocket attacks on the Ventura Freeway, culminating in the courthouse bombing, Pratt testified.

Agents arrested Cockrell at his home Sept. 25 on a no-bail warrant, and Los Angeles County prosecutors filed charges the following week: four counts each of attempted murder and solicitation to commit the murders of the car dealer and his wife, Bradbury and Bradbury’s staff.

Soon after his arrest, Cockrell asked O’Neill to again release him in lieu of $100,000 bail, arguing that he had appeared at each and every court hearing in his fraud case for more than a year.

But O’Neill turned him down Friday, saying that even if he were released on bail, Los Angeles County authorities have a warrant for his arrest.

“There has been a dramatic change in the circumstances, and bail is denied at this time because of the hold in Los Angeles County, because of the charges filed there and because of the evidence presented in support of these charges,” O’Neill said. He said that Cockrell presents “the threat of serious harm.”