Cooley Gets Backing of Ex-D.A.

District attorney candidate Steve Cooley picked up a major endorsement Wednesday when John Van de Kamp, the former Los Angeles County district attorney and state attorney general, said he was supporting the challenger over two-term incumbent Gil Garcetti.

In an unusually evenhanded statement, Van de Kamp praised Garcetti, saying the incumbent “deserves great credit for a long, distinguished public career.” But he said eight years is enough for any district attorney and it is time for a change. He called Cooley “able, experienced, conscientious, fair,” and willing to take difficult positions “even when they may run against the current tide.”

Van de Kamp said this was the first time he had endorsed any candidate for district attorney since his own tenure in the office from 1975 to 1983. He said he thought it was important to endorse Cooley, a career prosecutor, because most voters don’t know much about him. Both Cooley and Garcetti worked for Van de Kamp as deputy district attorneys.

The endorsement is significant, in part because of Van de Kamp’s standing in the California Democratic Party. Although the district attorney’s race is officially nonpartisan, Garcetti, a Democrat, has tried to make it an issue that Cooley is a Republican, attempting to paint the challenger as a right-wing extremist.

“He’s not an extremist,” Van de Kamp said pointedly in his statement.

Van de Kamp was a relatively popular attorney general from 1983 to 1991, and was considered a strong candidate for governor before losing a bruising Democratic primary fight with Dianne Feinstein in 1990.

Cooley issued a statement saying Van de Kamp’s endorsement was a “tremendous boost” to his campaign. Garcetti declined to comment, but his campaign manager, Eric Nasarenko, brushed it off, saying the incumbent “continues to enjoy broad-based support from more than 100 elected officials, including the current attorney general, Bill Lockyear.”

Still, the Van de Kamp endorsement comes against a backdrop of significant support for Cooley within the criminal justice community. That support was demonstrated in campaign contribution reports, filed last week, that showed that in the four months after the March 7 primary, Cooley received more than 400 contributions from lawyers and law firms, including more than 100 contributions from fellow prosecutors.

The contributions from deputy district attorneys alone totaled more than $40,000. In all, Cooley received $574,000 between Feb. 20 and June 30, compared with $494,000 for Garcetti. Garcetti, who finished second in the primary and has trailed Cooley in public opinion polls, still has far more money available because he raised more earlier in the campaign.

In addition to the contributions from lawyers, Cooley received contributions from 40 judges or court commissioners, nearly 40 bail bond agents and some police officers, sheriff’s deputies and court clerks.

Garcetti, by contrast, received contributions from only 89 lawyers. He has refused to take contributions from deputy district attorneys or judges, saying that would constitute a conflict of interest. Earlier in the campaign, he castigated Cooley for “putting the arm” on his colleagues in the criminal justice system.

Nasarenko criticized Cooley again Wednesday, saying he “keeps feeding from the same trough, which just underscores how narrow and weak his support is.”

Cooley has defended the practice. Noting that the core of his support was from within the criminal justice system, Cooley said Wednesday, “I am very proud of that, because these are people who know what is going on in the criminal justice system, and know who I am.”

Garcetti relies on no single core group for support, but accepted substantial funds from the health care industry, real estate and property management agents and jewelers. He also took $6,500 in contributions from 13 executives of Imperial Bank.

Cooley criticized the Imperial Bank contributions, noting that the district attorney’s office leases a substantial amount of space in an Imperial Bank building. He compared those contributions with Garcetti’s acceptance of $15,000 in campaign contributions last year from Lockheed Martin IMS employees, just after the prosecutor’s office recommended that the company get an extra $2.5 million for running the county’s child support computer system. Garcetti has said he had nothing to do with that decision.

Nasarenko said the Imperial Bank lease predated Garcetti’s tenure as district attorney and was not handled directly by the district attorney’s office, but by a county real estate office. “The contributions come from the fact that Gil has a long-standing friendship with George Graziadio of Imperial Bank,” Nasarenko said.

Garcetti far outgunned Cooley in the celebrity contribution category, with donations from actors Sylvester Stallone and Sally Kellerman, producers Marvin Davis, Rob Reiner and Aaron Spelling, and media baron Rupert Murdoch. He also received a contribution from Eli Broad, the Sun America Corp. chairman who is a powerful player in local Democratic politics. Cooley’s celebrity column was pretty much limited to composer Bill Conti. He also received a contribution from mayoral candidate Steve Soboroff.