Prosecutor’s Son Arrested Again

For the second time since his father was elected, the son of Orange County Dist. Atty. Tony Rackauckas has been arrested on drug-related charges.

Orange County sheriff’s deputies picked up Anthony C. Rackauckas, 31, about 4 a.m. Sunday after finding him asleep in the nude with about 2 grams of cocaine and a pipe in his truck outside Irvine Park in Orange, according to a police report.

The prosecutor’s son pleaded guilty to possession charges and was placed in a diversion program that will allow his conviction to be erased if he attends counseling and remains clean for 18 months.

“I love my son and want to support him as a father would and help him get through this,” the district attorney said in a statement. “I hope he succeeds in rehabilitating himself through the diversion program.”

Rackauckas stressed that his son would get no special treatment. “When I found out about this, I immediately turned the case over to the attorney general and haven’t in any way interfered with the judicial process or asked for any favoritism,” he said.

This is not the first time Rackauckas’ son has been in trouble with the law, court records show. He attended counseling to clear a 1998 marijuana arrest in Orange County. According to court records, he has $31,000 in outstanding warrants in Los Angeles County for drug and traffic charges.

Rackauckas’ wife, Cindy, was arrested in April on suspicion of drunk driving and misdemeanor hit-and-run, according to court records. She is scheduled to appear in court Friday. The case is being handled by the state attorney general’s office to avoid a conflict of interest.

The prosecutor’s son, held on $10,000 bail at the main jail in Santa Ana, declined a request to be interviewed.

An Orange County judge declared the son indigent Tuesday and assigned a deputy public defender to defend him. He works as a self-employed plumber.

Mike Murphy, the deputy attorney general who handled the son’s case, said Tuesday’s resolution to the case is fair. “If they qualify for diversion, that’s what we do. It was the normal course in a case like this,” he said.