Inmate Gets New Hearing After O.C. Probation Officer’s Lapse

A La Habra man who was sentenced to seven years in prison for violating probation will get a new hearing because his probation officer falsely told the court he hadn’t attended any of their meetings, an appellate court ruled this week.

Deputy Orange County Probation Officer Thomas Erikson testified in August 2004 that he had “never seen” convicted drug user Gregory R. Gayton and that he had violated probation by not enrolling in a drug rehabilitation program.

But Erikson’s own file showed that the two had met at least twice and that Gayton said he was applying to a San Clemente rehab center.

“Had Gayton’s probation file been reviewed and utilized, it would have revealed that Erikson’s ‘recollections’ were not worth the paper they were transcribed on,” Associate Justice William W. Bedsworth wrote. “While we hesitate to suggest he might have been intentionally misrepresenting facts to the court, the file does suggest his conduct was something beyond ordinary negligence.”

The judge also blasted Gayton’s public defender, the district attorney and the judge who heard the case, saying they had failed to get the truth.

“I have never seen a case where there appeared to be mistakes made by every single person that touched it,” said Jennifer Gambale, Gayton’s court-appointed appellate attorney. Gambale said she’d been unable to reach Gayton, who is at High Desert State Prison in Susanville, Calif., to tell him of the new hearing.

The Orange County Probation Department plans to investigate the incident, said spokeswoman Vicki Mathews.

Gayton, 37, pleaded guilty in 2003 to three felony charges including possession of methamphetamine. He was placed on three years’ probation and ordered to serve a year in county jail, followed by a year in a live-in drug rehabilitation facility and a year of follow-up care. If he violated probation, he would go to prison for seven years.

In May 2004, two months after Gayton was released from his year in jail, Erikson recommended that the court revoke Gayton’s probation and issue a warrant for his arrest, saying he was unreachable and had not reported to probation a month earlier, as directed. Erikson also said that Gayton had ignored a court order to enter the residential drug program. Police arrested Gayton on June 1, 2004, during a traffic stop.

During a hearing in August 2004, Erikson testified seven times that he had never seen Gayton and that Gayton had made no attempt to contact him. Erikson also denied ever testing Gayton for drugs.

But when Gayton took the stand, he insisted he had met Erikson at least three times, and described each meeting in detail.

During their first meeting, Gayton recalled, Erikson had trouble taking his picture because the camera system was new. Gayton told Erikson he was living in Long Beach and that he was applying for funding to enroll in a San Clemente rehab program. At a second meeting, Gayton told the court, he took a drug test and promised to keep the officer updated on his progress.

Because different accounts were presented, Bedsworth wrote, Gayton’s attorney, Deputy Public Defender Joe Flohr, should have asked to see his client’s probation file.

Flohr did not ask for the file, telling the appellate court he “did not get any indication that [Erikson] was less than truthful with me.”

Superior Court Judge Kelly MacEachern believed Erikson. She found Gayton in violation of his probation and sentenced him to seven years in prison.