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 Archive for the 'Judges' CategoryMemorial service set for Judge Dan DutcherJune 30th, 2009, 11:54 am by Larry WelbornA memorial service for former Orange County Municipal Court Judge Dutcher served 12 years as a judge in the Westminster courthouse between 1982 and 1994 and was twice elected presiding judge. Former judge Dan Dutcher passes awayJune 29th, 2009, 1:32 pm by Larry WelbornSad to hear word this morning that Daniel C. Dutcher, who served on the Orange County Municipal Court bench for 12 years, died Saturday at his Santa Ana home after a long battle with cancer. He was 78. Dutcher was elected to a spot on the Westminster Municipal Court bench in 1982 when he challenged the residential status of Joanne Harrold, the incumbent judge. After a Superior Court judge ruled that Harrold — who had easily won re-election in the June primary — was not a legal resident of Orange County, Dutcher won in the runoff election in November against another attorney. He served 12 years on the bench, and was twice elected presiding judge of the Westminster courthouse. In one of his more newsworthy cases, Dutcher ordered a mom to stand trial on manslaughter charges after she forgot that she left her 3-month-old twins in a parked car in Garden Grove in the mid 1980s. The babies died of heat stroke. “People don’t leave children in cars,” Dutcher said. He called it “the grossest negligence,” according to published accounts. But he was unseated in 1994 by prosecutor Caryl Lee in a bitter campaign in which he sued his opponent for slander as a result of campaign smears. He claimed later that he received an out-of court settlement. He also unsuccessfully sought election three times to the Superior Court bench — in 1990, 1996 and 2002. Dutcher practiced private law in Orange County for 25 years before he became a judge, and continued to practice law after he left the bench. He handled his last case in October. He was smart, funny and candid man who never hesitated to say what he thought. He was a graduate of the University of Iowa and Loyola University Law School. Dutcher is survived by his wife Barbara; three children, Jennifer, of Santa Ana, Ted, of Chicago, and Dondi, of Wisconsin; four grandchildren, and a sister, Cindy, of Oakland. Services are pending. Serial murder suspects insists he wants to be his own lawyerJune 12th, 2009, 1:42 pm by Larry WelbornRodney James Alcala, one of Orange County’s most But Superior Court Judge Francisco Briseno insists that would be bad idea. Briseno earlier this month rejected Alcala’s most recent request to discharge his court-appointed lawyers and go to trial representing himself in five sex-related murders from back in the 1970s. Alcala is now back in court requesting the same thing again, but this time with the help from the lawyers he is trying to fire. Defense attorneys Richard Schwartzberg and George Peters claim in a motion filed in Briseno’s court today that the U.S. Consitution guarantees Alcala the right to proceed in propria persona (which is Latin for representing yourself), so long that he is not delaying the orderly process of the case and is mentally competent. Schwartzberg writes that the scheduled trial is four months away, and Alacala is not asking for a continuance, so therefore there is no delaying of the orderly process of the case. And there has been no showing that Alcala, who reportedly has a near-genius IQ, is anything but competent, Schwartzberg added. “Although no one in the courtroom, save the defendant, will believe this decision is in (Alcala’s) best interest, the Federal Constitution grants Rodney Alcala the right to self-representation under the present circumstances,” Schwartzberg concluded. The defense attorney, who practices law out of San Francisco, asked for a new hearing on the matter on June 22.
But both times his convictions were reversed on appeal. Before he could come to trial for a third time, he was linked him through DNA evidence to four unsolved murders of young women in Los Angeles County between 1977 and 1979. Prosecutors in Orange and Los Angeles counties now plan to jointly try Alcala a third time in Orange County in the Samsoe case, plus the four recently developed Los Angeles County cases. Crazy busy: two death penalty cases in one courtroomJune 11th, 2009, 3:15 pm by Larry WelbornSuperior Court Judge William R. Froeberg and his staff were crazy busy yesterday. They had one jury deliberating a life or death decision in the jury room in one case while they were selecting a jury in the courtroom in another potential death penalty case. Longtime courtroom observers cannot remember a time in the 30 years or so since the death penalty was reinstated in California that one courtroom was in progress with jurors or prospective jurors on two potential death cases at the same time. Meanhile, jurors in People v. Jason Aguirre (right) continued to deliberate late They have been asked to decide if the 33-year-old gang member should be executed for the shooting death of Minh Cong Tran. 13, on August 12, 2003, for the benefit of his gang — a special circumstance that qualified him for a potential death penalty. Their only other possible verdict in this phase of the case is life without the possibility of parole. Witnesses testified during the guilt-innocence phase that Aguirre and his gang mistook Tran and his uncle, brother and cousin — who were just out to get some Mexican food — for members of a rival gang.
The jury that will be sworn in next week will sit in judgment in the penalty phase for Martinez, 32, who was found guilty last year of two counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of Nicholas Casas, 83, and his wife, Emilia, 73, in their home on Ninth Street in Santa Ana on Dec. 29, 2004. This jury will decide if Martinez gets the death penalty or life without parole after the previous jury found that he commited two special circumstances: multiple murders and murders during the commission of a robbery There are usually only a handful of death penalty cases a year in the Orange County court system. The Martinez case, for example, will be just the fourth death penalty hearing this year. Froeberg, the second-most experienced judge on the Orange County bench, gets a lot of these cases. He is assigned to the long-cause criminal calender to handle cases that might last three or more weeks. Death penalty not the only tough term handed down FridayMay 1st, 2009, 2:30 pm by Larry WelbornThe presidentially-named John Fitzgerald Kennedy, who got the death penalty for his role in the yacht case murders, wasn’t the only convicted killer to feel the sting of Judge Frank F. Fasel’s measure of justice on Friday. Moments before Kennedy was sent off to Death Row at San Quentin prison, Fasel gave gang member Jose Vargas, 22, life without parole for murder, plus 25-years to life for a gang-sentencing enhancement, plus another life term for attempted murder. It doesn’t like like Vargas, who went by the gang moniker of “Shadow,” will ever again see his shadow outside of prison. Deputy District Attorney Dave Porter said Vargas was riding around in his gang’s territory in Anaheim on a bicycle on Sept. 9, 2005 when he came across two strangers. After he didn’t get what he felt was the appropriate answer when he asked them where they were from, Vargas started shooting, Porter said. Eddie Cija, 32, of Santa Ana, was hit in the head and died a few days later, Porter said. The gunfire missed Juan Mendoza, 25. Vargas was arrested hiding in a nearby apartment after abandoning the bike at the scene, Porter said. He was later linked to the bike by DNA evidence. Miguel Alexander Vargas, Jose’s brother, is also in deep trouble with the law, Porter said. You may remember Miguel. He’s the parolee charged with fatally stabbing his estranged girlfriend in her Placentia home in front of their two children on Feb. 5, a few days after he was released from custody following a domestic violence arrest. Annette Angelina Alvarado, 23, was stabbed 20 times in the back. Miguel Vargas was arrested two weeks later after he tried to flee to Mexico. It’s early, but prosecutors are eyeing judgeships in 2010April 21st, 2009, 2:15 pm by Larry WelbornThe next election for judgeships in Orange County Superior Court is 14 months away, but some prosecutors are already staking their claims to potentially open positions. Longtime veteran judges Margaret Anderson and Donna Crandall plan on retiring at the end of their terms in December 2010, and both have endorsed prosecutors to take their seats. Anderson, who in 1985 became the only deputy public defender to successfully challenge a sitting judge to win a spot on the Orange County Municipal Court bench, is endorsing Deputy District Attormey Scott Steiner to be her replacement. She presides over a courtroom in the Harbor Justice Center in Newport Beach. Steiner has been a deputy district attorney for ten years. Crandall, who went from a court clerk to prosecutor to judge (first winning election to the municipal court bench in 1993, is endorsing Deputy District Attorney Nico “Nick” Dourbetas for her seat. Dourbetas has been in prosecutor in Orange County for 11 years. Deputy District Attorney Andre “Andy” Manssourian also plans on running for judge in the June 2010 elections, but he said he will not challenge either Steiner or Dourbetas. Instead, Manssourian said he is confident that another seat will open up and he will declare for it. Manssourian has been a prosecutor for nine years after two years in private practice. Most judges are appointed by governor. But some spots are filled by election if the sitting judge serves to the end of his or her term. Both Anderson and Crandall became judges through election, and both intend to have their seats filled in the same manner. One of the advantages for candidates to declare early is to scare off other would-be challengers. ADVERTISEMENT
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Daniel C. Dutcher, who died Saturday at his home in Santa Ana after a long battle with cancer, is scheduled for 2 p.m. Tuesday July 7, at Holy Family Cathedral, 566 S. Glassell St., Orange.
notorious serial-murder suspects, insists on acting as his own lawyer in his upcoming third death penalty trial.
Alcala, now 65, was sentenced to death in Orange County twice for the headline-making murder in 1979 of Robin Samsoe (left), a 12-year-old Huntington Beach ballet student abducted while riding a bicycle near her home.
Thursday.
And attorneys in People v. Carlos Martinez (left) were going through questionnaires submitted in Froeberg’s court yesterday in prepartion for jury selection.