State to Take Over Alvarez Prosecution

Fearing the appearance of impropriety, Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury has turned over to the state attorney general any future prosecution of the 22-year-old man suspected of strangling and attempting to rape Oak View teenager Kali Manley.

The decision, announced late Tuesday, follows ongoing correspondence between Bradbury and state prosecutors over his relationship with the parents of murder suspect David Alvarez.

Eugene and Marie Alvarez are longtime friends and political supporters of the district attorney, and they live in the same Ojai community.

Although state prosecutors determined a month ago that no legal conflict of interest exists, Bradbury urged them last week to reconsider handling the case.

“My friendship with the defendant’s parents is certain to raise serious questions in the public’s mind about all case-related decisions by this office,” he wrote in a two-page letter dated Jan. 28.

“In turn,” he wrote, “the ultimate verdict in this case will be questioned and public confidence in the criminal justice system’s integrity may be permanently harmed.”

On Tuesday, Nathan Barankin, a spokesman for Atty. Gen. Bill Lockyer, said state prosecutors agreed to assume control of any case arising from the murder investigation. The state will also prosecute two unrelated criminal cases against Alvarez.

It is possibly the first time that the attorney general’s office has agreed to prosecute a Ventura County murder case, according to local attorneys.

“Based upon the correspondence,” Barankin said, “it seems appropriate for us to take responsibility for these cases and the ongoing investigation in order to accommodate the district attorney.”

Alvarez has not been charged in the girl’s slaying, and Barankin said Tuesday that the filing of any charges relating to her death could be weeks away as state investigators review the evidence.

Meanwhile, Ventura defense attorney James M. Farley, who will represent Alvarez if charges are filed, praised Bradbury’s decision.

“I am glad to see he did it,” Farley said. “He was in a tight spot. Ojai is a small community and I think it would have given the appearance of favoritism or impropriety if he had kept the case.”

And given the district attorney’s relationship to his client’s parents, Farley said: “I’d have been filling motions all the time for conflict, conflict, conflict.”

Alvarez is facing potential murder and attempted rape charges in what could become a death penalty case, according to Bradbury’s letter.

A freshman at Nordhoff High School, Manley, 14, was last seen with Alvarez and another man the night of Dec. 19 at a Miramonte convenience store.

Her disappearance launched a search by volunteers and the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department, which ended Dec. 26 when Alvarez--who was in custody on another matter--led authorities to her body.

The girl, who had been strangled, was lying inside a large drainage pipe in the mountains above Ojai, about 40 miles from the city limits.

Alvarez decided to lead authorities to the site, despite Bradbury’s refusal to agree not seek the death penalty in exchange for his help. Nonetheless, it was Bradbury who drove Alvarez and his lawyers to the scene.

Bradbury noted those events in his letter to the attorney general and explained that public reaction to Alvarez’s former defense attorney’s attempts to negotiate a deal prompted much criticism.

Bradbury explains that all of these events have heightened his concern about his office’s ability to take this case--particularly if at some point he had to decide whether to seek the death penalty against his friends’ son.

A court hearing is set Thursday for Alvarez on an unrelated terrorist threats charge, for which he is being held in the County Jail on $250,000 bail.

Farley said a second hearing in that case is set Feb. 11, at which time state prosecutors are expected to appear in court.

Alvarez is charged with waving a loaded gun at a woman in the parking lot of the Miramonte convenience store the same night that Manley disappeared.

In a separate case, he also faces a charge of domestic battery for allegedly assaulting his estranged wife last summer.