Judge to not seek U.S. atty. position
Longtime federal judge Dickran M. Tevrizian has withdrawn his name from consideration as the next U.S. attorney in Los Angeles, it was learned Wednesday.
Though Tevrizian declined to comment, others in the legal community said the 66-year-old jurist had recently notified a search committee for the Justice Department that he no longer was a candidate for the job.
Only days ago, Tevrizian, a U.S. District Court judge, was viewed as one of the leading candidates for the position, which has jurisdiction over federal prosecutions in a seven-county area.
But Tuesday, the judge told attorneys in a case before him that he would not pursue the post, a lawyer said.
“Basically he said he wasn’t that interested in the job and had put his name in consideration because others had asked him to,” said attorney Dale Rubin.
Rubin is representing one of two men facing the death penalty in Tevrizian’s court for a kidnapping and murder rampage.
One day before Tevrizian’s disclosure, attorneys for the two defendants had asked him to recuse himself because of the possibility that he might soon be running the very office prosecuting the case, Rubin said.
“It is not that he is biased,” Rubin said.
“It was just the appearance of impropriety we were trying to avoid,” the attorney said.
Tevrizian referred the motion to another judge for a decision, Rubin said.
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