Man on Death Row Granted New Trial

A former Sun Valley man who has been on death row since his 1983 conviction for the murders of his father, stepmother and 8-year-old stepsister is entitled to a new trial following a U.S. Supreme Court decision not to review the case.

The high court, without comment Tuesday, let stand a December federal appeals court ruling that said Robert Bloom’s trial attorney, Encino lawyer Sherwin Edelberg, did not provide him with a constitutionally adequate defense. The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals had thrown out Bloom’s convictions and ordered the case returned to state court.

Bloom’s appellate attorney, Dylan Schaffer, described his client, who is in prison at San Quentin, as “thrilled and looking forward to the chance to go back to L.A. County.”

Los Angeles Deputy Dist. Atty. Steven J. Ipsen said that, given what he called the “outrageous” facts in the case, Bloom would “absolutely” be retried.

Edelberg defended his handling of the original trial but added: “I’d rather be called ineffective on the case than to have the young man killed, frankly.”

Bloom was 18 in April 1982 when he was charged with shooting his father, Robert Bloom Sr., to death outside their Sun Valley home. He also was charged with shooting and killing his stepmother, Josephine Lou Bloom, and with killing his stepsister, 8-year-old Sandra Hughes Bloom, who was stabbed 24 times with a pair of scissors and shot inside the family home.

The brutal slayings drew additional attention when Bloom fired Edelberg following his conviction, served as his own attorney during the trial’s penalty phase and asked the jury for death, saying he would “laugh all day long” if sentenced to life. The seven-woman, five-man jury obliged.

In upholding the death sentence in 1989, the state Supreme Court ruled for the first time that a defendant could act as his own lawyer and ask to be put to death without causing the issue to cross into the realm of state-assisted suicide.

But the conviction was overturned when the appeals court ruled 3 to 0 that Edelberg erred in not giving an expert witness, psychiatrist Arthur Kling, enough background on Bloom’s alleged history of child abuse. The additional information, the court ruled, could have changed the verdicts in the case.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Robert C. Schneider, who handled the appeal, said Tuesday that before the case went to the appeals court, the federal district court listened to a court-selected expert and then ruled that Kling was given more information than is normally provided in such cases.

But the appeals court disagreed. Given the selectivity of the U.S. Supreme Court, both sides said they had expected that the appeals court ruling would most likely stand.

Authorities said prosecutors in Los Angeles will have 60 days to return Bloom to jail here to await a new trial. Because of the seriousness of the charges, Bloom will not be released on bail, authorities said.

Although 16 years have elapsed, the prosecution and the defense agreed that the evidence against Bloom remains compelling.

“There is very powerful evidence that Robert Bloom killed three people,” said Schaffer, who described his client as “still volatile.”

“There was no self-defense [motive] put forward at trial.”

Schaffer, who was not certain whether he would continue to represent Bloom, declined to discuss any defense strategy for a new trial.

Ipsen, the county prosecutor, said it was inappropriate to discuss trial strategy.

Schneider said he does not believe the case will suffer much from flagging memories.

“I would hope that most people would remember seeing someone shot and killed on the front lawn. That’s something that stays with you,” he said.