D.A., Police Challenged on Wiretap Practices

The Los Angeles County public defender’s office, in a move that could affect an untold number of criminal cases, has requested a court order requiring the district attorney and the Los Angeles Police Department to reveal the names of all defendants who came to their attention through previously undisclosed wiretaps.

The sweeping request represents the latest challenge to a long-standing practice by police and prosecutors of going after individuals whose alleged wrongdoing first surfaces during wiretaps directed at others. That practice, known as a “handoff” of information from one group of detectives to another, already has come under fire in the trial of three alleged drug traffickers accused of dealing $20 million in cocaine.

Last week, the district attorney’s office turned over more than 100 pages of wiretap documents in that drug case after being unable to prove to a judge that authorities had any reason--other than the results of electronic surveillance--to suspect the three men of wrongdoing.

Now, the nation’s largest public defender’s office has filed court papers to determine how many of its clients may have been charged or even convicted over the years without knowing about wiretaps. Officials of the agency said such actions would be disturbing because of the public defender’s volume of cases and the Constitution’s guarantees against unlawful search and seizure.

“We took this action because, if what we believe is true, we feel it is an outrageous attempt by law enforcement to subvert the 4th Amendment . . . and the requirements of both state and federal laws authorizing wiretaps,” said Assistant Public Defender Robert Kalunian.

In a letter Monday to attorneys in his office, Public Defender Michael Judge said the writ was filed because the pending drug case suggests that the district attorney’s office and the LAPD have been involved in practices designed to “hide the existence” of wiretaps that play a role in criminal cases.

And because such actions appear to be “flagrant violations” of the law, Judge said, the office is seeking both the names of defendants prosecuted as a result of the wiretaps and the evidence obtained from surveillance in those cases.

In addition, Judge noted, the writ asks a judge to declare the handoff procedure illegal so that it cannot be used again by police or prosecutors.

The district attorney’s office had no comment on the filing, but officials there and with the LAPD have long maintained that the wiretapping practice is legal. Just as significantly, perhaps, authorities also have dismissed the notion that it has been used with abandon over the years.

To the contrary, police and prosecutors have said, wiretaps have been used only in a limited number of cases since California’s wiretap law was adopted in 1989. The head of the LAPD’s narcotics bureau, in fact, recently said his officers have used only two wiretaps since the law took effect.

But in its motion, the public defender’s office suggested that the use of wiretaps by law enforcement has been pervasive.

Citing statistics compiled by the FBI and other sources, the public defender’s office said Los Angeles County led the nation in electronic surveillance activity from Jan. 1, 1993, to March 1, 1995. During that period, law enforcement agencies in Los Angeles County were involved in nearly 1,100 surveillance interceptions--more than twice the number in Dade County, Fla., which had the second-highest number.

Moreover, the court papers say, other references, including the 1996 Sourcebook of Criminal Justice Statistics, show how widespread the impact of one wiretap can be: The average wiretap lasts 40 days, almost always involves narcotics cases and includes an average of 84 people and 2,140 conversations.

But of those conversations, according to the court papers, an average of only 373 are incriminating. And each wiretap, the court papers say, leads, on average, to only two to four arrests and only one or two convictions.

While the case that brought the handoff wiretap practice to light involved the three alleged drug traffickers represented by private attorneys, the public defender’s office cited one of its own cases as reason for entering the issue.

Early this year, the court papers say, Reyes Sanchez Salcido was charged with attempting to sell cocaine during surveillance by LAPD narcotics detectives. But the arrest report, court papers say, does not explain how or why detectives launched the surveillance.

During Salcido’s preliminary hearing, an LAPD detective testified that a fellow investigator called the defendant’s residence. Court papers also say the prosecutor in the case argued that authorities were not required to disclose how they obtained Salcido’s phone number.

And during the early stages of that case, the court papers say, the prosecutor twice sought to meet privately with the judge to discuss the deputy public defender’s request for information about evidence.

Those basic facts parallel the case that first raised questions about the handoff procedure.

In that case, attorneys for Lauro Gaxiola, Antonio Gastelum and Carlos Lobo first concluded that their clients were picked up on a wiretap when the prosecutor requested closed-door meetings with Superior Court Judge Gregory Alarcon about the nature of the evidence.

Last week, after defense attorneys won the right to review the nature of that evidence, Alarcon scheduled a May 1 hearing to consider whether that evidence can be unsealed or remain solely in the custody of the prosecution and defense.