Compton Ousting 2 in Council Election

Two Compton City Council incumbents facing a criminal trial on charges that they misused public funds appeared to be headed for defeat late Tuesday in a municipal election that was monitored by the California secretary of state’s office.

Amen Rahh and Delores Zurita were trailing significantly with 29 of 31 precincts counted. Compton school board member Barbara Calhoun was beating Zurita, while school board President Isadore Hall was well ahead of Rahh, according to unofficial returns.

Rahh, a professor at Compton City College and Cal State Long Beach, and Zurita, a businesswoman and aunt of defeated Mayor Omar Bradley, were arrested in March on charges of misusing city funds. Council members Yvonne Arceneaux and City Manager John D. Johnson II were also arrested and charged.

Rahh was running against four opponents: Hall; school administrator Fred Easter; stationery store owner and former Councilman Fred Cressel; and Willie McReynolds, who was a leader of a failed attempt to recall Bradley.

Challenging Zurita was a 19-year-old, Rodney Andrews Jr., and Calhoun, a school district board member backed by Mayor Eric Perrodin.

Two officials from the secretary of state’s office were on hand to monitor balloting in case any questions or disputes arose, at the request of the City Council. The Sheriff’s Department said deputies were called to a polling place because Bradley was ordering drivers to move their cars. He claimed they bore campaign signs.

Another glitch took place when two voters cast their ballots inside the silver sport utility vehicle of the city clerk, after their polling place, a Seventh-day Adventist church, remained locked for three hours.

City Clerk Charles Davis, whose handling of the last election drew a reproach from a Superior Court judge, said earlier that he took the request for state monitors as an attempt to remove him from the process.

“They’re trying to get me out of it,” he said of the City Council, which is still dominated by Bradley supporters.

After the 2001 election that resulted in his defeat, Bradley sued Compton and Davis. Superior Court Judge Judith Churlin ruled in Bradley’s favor and threw out the election. But last month an appellate court overturned that decision.

In requesting the state’s intervention this time, the City Council wrote that the 2001 elections had been “beset by irregularities, questionable practices, allegations of fraud, threats and intimidation at poll sites.”

Two other cities also had elections Tuesday. In Pasadena, where a runoff election was held for the Board of Education Seat 4, school administrator William A. Bibbiani defeated Cristine Soto, a Juvenile Court attorney.

In Arcadia, the three incumbents on the Arcadia Unified School District Board won reelection, fending off the three challengers.

With all votes counted, the winners were Maryann Gibson, John R. McClain and James C. Romo.

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Times staff writer Monte Morin contributed to this report