March 31--The Orange County Bar Assn. denounced the Orange County district attorney's office's repeated attempts to disqualify a judge from cases, calling such tactics "excessive" and a possible affront to the whole judiciary, according to a resolution released Monday.
Since February 2014, Orange County prosecutors have asked to disqualify Superior Court Judge Thomas Goethals in 57 cases, according to court records. Over the three previous years, prosecutors submitted five disqualification requests.
With no explanation needed, prosecutors can invoke Section 170.6 of the state's code of civil procedure to get a judge tossed from a case on grounds that the judge is "prejudiced."
But the county bar association found this so-called papering of Goethals to warrant a formal condemnation in the form of a resolution passed Friday.
"The excessive use of Section 170.6 ... can give the appearance of being designed as punitive and retaliatory and going beyond the realm of appropriate criticism," the bar association's resolution said.
Increasing disqualifications coincided with Goethals' allowing hearings on whether prosecutors and jailers misused a jailhouse informant program.
Earlier this month, Goethals removed the D.A.'s office from the death penalty phase of the trial of mass shooter Scott Dekraai, concluding that prosecutors' failed to turn over evidence to the defense.
"Certain aspects of the district attorney's performance in this case might be described as a comedy of errors but for the fact that it has been so sadly deficient," Goethals wrote in his ruling.
The state attorney general's office would have handled the death penalty phase of Dekraai's trial, but the office is appealing Goethal's decision.
Times staff writer Christopher Goffard contributed to this report.
