Key Prosecutor in Assault Gun Cases Removed

Atty. Gen. Dan Lungren, taking heat for his floundering efforts to enforce the state’s landmark assault weapons law, has reassigned the veteran state prosecutor who had led attempts to carry out the 1989 law.

Lungren, the state’s top law enforcement official, took the action after Deputy Atty. Gen. Paul Bishop--Lungren’s gun expert since he took office seven years ago--made a highly unusual appearance last month in Sacramento Superior Court to represent two young men who had been charged in a drug case.

Moreover, Lungren made the change after his office was criticized by local law enforcement officials for siding with a defendant who had been charged with possessing an assault weapon that the Santa Clara County district attorney’s office contended was illegal.

As Lungren’s lead lawyer assigned to assault weapons cases, Bishop signed a brief submitted in February to the state Supreme Court siding with the defendant and arguing that the confiscated assault weapon was not prohibited by the 1989 Assault Weapons Control Act--a position the Santa Clara County prosecutor handling the case called “appalling.”

Lungren repudiated that stand last month after The Times in August detailed his office’s handling of assault weapons matters. In an about-face, Lungren withdrew the brief and asked the state high court not to consider his prior position.

Given such missteps, Lungren, the probable Republican nominee for governor next year, is sure to face political attacks from the Democratic nominee over his handling of assault weapons.

In an indication of the issue’s sensitivity, Lungren replaced Bishop, a 25-year veteran of the office, with Deputy Atty. Gen. John Gordnier, who has handled high-profile matters for Lungren, including the medical use of marijuana. He also was the prosecutor who accepted former Los Angeles Police Det. Mark Fuhrman’s plea of no contest to a perjury charge.

As part of the reshuffling, Lungren assigned Special Assistant Atty. Gen. Kevin Holsclaw, formerly a high-ranking U.S. Justice Department lawyer, to oversee assault weapon litigation. Holsclaw is a Lungren political appointee and was on Lungren’s congressional staff.

Lungren spokesman Rob Stutzman said Bishop was reassigned three weeks ago, but would not specify the reasons, citing personnel laws protecting state workers from such disclosures.

However, Stutzman said Bishop’s appearance in the drug case “violated department policies and appropriate disciplinary action was taken.”

“The policy is you cannot provide private counsel to individuals,” Stutzman said.

Bishop insisted in an interview that he was not reassigned for disciplinary reasons. Rather, he said, he did not have time to litigate gun cases and handle duties in the attorney general’s gambling regulation section, where he now works full-time.

“I never asked to do gun cases,” Bishop said. “It is nothing that I aspired to make a career out of.”

Bishop had been the main state prosecutor handling gun issues since Lungren took office in 1991, and his views influenced Lungren’s assault weapons policy.

Under Lungren, the state has held to a narrow definition of the law’s reach. That stand has been criticized by gun control advocates, prosecutors and judges involved in assault weapons cases, as well as by the law’s two authors--former state Sen. David Roberti and former Assemblyman Mike Roos.

Bishop brushed off criticism of the office’s handling of assault weapons cases, and the new position being taken by Lungren. “As to why the attorney general takes a position, I’ve never much cared . . . I don’t have an interest in guns one way or another. . . . They’re just not an issue with me.”

The 1989 Roberti-Roos Assault Weapons Control Act restricts 75 specific firearms, and it provides a process by which the attorney general can add new assault weapons that are copycats of the listed guns.

However, the “add-on” process became ineffective six years ago when Colt Manufacturing Co., having produced a new weapon similar to one of the restricted guns, filed a lawsuit against Lungren challenging the law’s constitutionality.

Bishop, defending the act against Colt’s suit, consented early in the litigation to an injunction barring the state from adding weapons to the list of restricted guns. As a result, gun makers have continued to produce new versions of semiautomatic assault weapons and sell them in California.

Although a trial judge upheld the law, the case has languished in a state court of appeal in Sacramento for more than three years--and an injunction remains in place barring Lungren from restricting new weapons.

Attorneys in the case submitted their final written arguments in March 1995, meaning that the case has been ready for oral argument since then. Once lawyers appear before the justices and argue their case, the court has 90 days to issue its ruling.

With no explanation, the appellate court did not set oral arguments until Aug. 26, the day after The Times reported on the delay. On Aug. 26, the court scheduled the arguments for Oct. 22--although that too was postponed.

One of Colt’s lawyers asked the court Sept. 8 for a new delay. The attorney general’s office did not object to the postponement, and the court granted it Sept. 10, the same day Bishop was appearing in Sacramento Superior Court on behalf of the two drug defendants.

The Colt case is now scheduled to be argued in December.

Bishop said he made the Sept. 10 court appearance on behalf of both men because one of them is his godson, and the young man’s mother had asked him to help. He said he appeared in court to help his godson win a continuance so the defendants could enter a rehabilitation program.

The men, ages 20 and 21, were arrested in Sacramento on Sept. 8, when a police officer stopped the driver for speeding and noticed he had a marijuana cigarette tucked behind his ear. Police found a bag containing about an ounce of marijuana and a few hallucinogenic psilocybin mushrooms.

Bishop’s appearance caused a stir in the Sacramento County district attorney’s office, where Deputy Dist. Atty. William McCamy, who is handling the case, said it was something he would not consider doing.

“I can imagine if I had a close friend or relative perhaps attending court with them, trying to explain what was going on,” McCamy added. “But I’d feel unable to actually appear as counsel of record, even for a limited purpose. It would be in conflict with my role as a prosecutor.”

Bishop appeared on his own time and did not identify himself in open court as a state prosecutor. But he did give a clerk one of his business cards identifying himself a deputy attorney general, something he acknowledged was a mistake.

The men have other lawyers now.

“I thought I made it real clear to everyone what was going on,” Bishop said. “It would be improper to use the [attorney general’s] office to mislead someone or gain a special privilege for someone. But I don’t think that occurred.”