Metropolitan News-Enterprise, CA
Jan 14 2008
PERSONS OF THE YEAR: Robert Philibosian
Ex-District Attorney Earns Respect as Advocate, Advisor, and Activist
By KENNETH OFGANG, Staff Writer
When 43-year-old Robert Philibosian was defeated for a full term as
Los Angeles County district attorney in 1984, he did not `go gentle
into that good night.’
At a young age to be an ex-D.A., he built a new career. He is a
private attorney, a `go-to guy’ for people wanting action from local
government, a conservative activist who continues to voice great
pride in his role in the only successful effort to unseat sitting
California Supreme Court justices in the 75-year history of retention
elections, and a man whose advice and endorsement are sought by
candidates for every office including the presidency.
He has been asked again and again to run for public office – for the
Legislature, for judge, for state attorney general – and continues to
declare absolute disinterest. At age 67, he is now of counsel to the
firm of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton – having passed the maximum
retirement age for partners – but remains busy as ever, representing
clients and taking on assignments large and small, from serving on
state and county boards and commissions to emceeing the annual
MetNews Person of the Year dinner for the past 12 years.
This year, however, that chore falls to someone else because
Philibosian is a MetNews Person of the Year.
Philibosian is a native of San Diego, where he attended public
schools before his family moved to Selma, in rural Fresno County. He
knew two things at an early age, he says: that he wanted to be a
lawyer and that his politics were Republican.
His role model as a lawyer, he explains, was a maternal uncle,
Everett H. Berberian, who grew up around Fresno but practiced in the
Bay Area for many years. And as far as his party affiliation is
concerned, he says, he knew that by `the time I was old enough to
know the difference between an elephant and a donkey.’
His family was so conservative, he explains, that when they moved
north, they continued to read the San Diego Union – now the
Union-Tribune – a daily newspaper that is editorially conservative now
and was even more so then, he recalls. His father retained business
interests in San Diego, he notes, and preferred to have the
conservative San Diego paper mailed to him rather than read the
liberal Fresno Bee.
Stanford Campus
Philibosian was a mere youngster, he remembers, when he visited the
Stanford University campus to attend his uncle’s law school
graduation. He was admitted to the school himself a few years later,
joining the Republican Caucus and earning his undergraduate degree
with a major in political science.
It was a practical consideration, not a political one, that brought
him to Los Angeles in 1962.
He had to work his way through law school, he explains, and by
attending Southwestern Law School, he could study part-time and take
evening classes. (He retains his affinity for the school and has
served on its board since 1984.)
He got a job as a corporate `headhunter.’ It wasn’t bad work, he
says, but it didn’t have much to do with the career path he had
decided on – that of a practicing lawyer, and preferably a prosecutor.
He had an offer from a civil firm, to do insurance defense work, but
had neither accepted it nor turned it down at the time he showed up
for his civil service interview at the Hall of Administration.
Back in the 1960s, he explains, the county’s three civil service
legal offices – those of the district attorney, public defender, and
county counsel – would jointly interview prospective hires.
He’d been given no advance preparation for the session, he recalls,
and did not realize that he was going to be given a composite score
by the three examiners, so he turned to the other two panelists and
said, `Sorry, I don’t want to take your time, but I’m only interested
in the D.A.’s office.’
Fortunately, he recalls, the district attorney representative on the
panel – Deputy District Attorney Jack Cravens, now deceased – `perked up’
and, as soon as the interview was over, sent him over to the Hall of
Justice, where the district attorney was then-headquartered, and told
him to see `Mr. Ritzi.’
The eager prospective prosecutor ran out, having no idea where the
Hall of Justice was or who Mr. Ritzi, was, but figuring someone would
be able to direct him. Soon enough, he saw a uniformed sheriff’s
deputy who directed him to the right place, and discovered that
fortune was on his side that day.
Evelle Younger was the district attorney back then, and William Ritzi
(later a Los Angeles Superior Court judge) was the assistant district
attorney, the No. 3 person in the office. He was ushered into Ritzi’s
office, where the assistant district attorney asked him, `When can
you start?’
He took the job, even though it paid less than his civil offer – and
even less than he was making in his corporate job.
He began with the office in 1968, back in the days when newly minted
deputy district attorneys and deputy public defenders honed their
craft by making `the county run’ – floating from one office to another
for a week at a time.
`You’d go from El Monte to Compton to Torrance to East L.A. – all over
the place,’ he explains. The system may not have been terribly
efficient, but enabled the office to cover all of the courts, and
also gave supervisors an opportunity to `size up’ the young lawyers.
East Los Angeles
Philibosian eventually settled into an assignment in East Los
Angeles, which was considered a great slot for a young lawyer because
the courthouse was known for its `tough judges and tough defense
attorneys,’ he recalls. The head deputy district attorney was Robert
Devich, later a justice of the Court of Appeal, and one of the
judges, John Arguelles, went on to become a California Supreme Court
justice.
Devich, who retired from the bench in 1992, says he was not surprised
that Philibosian rose to great heights.
`He was a leadership-type guy’ who could handle a calendar of up to
120 cases a day, Devich recalls. `He was tough, but I found him to be
fair, and he knew the value of cases. He got along with the public
defenders and handled the calendar very well.’
The assignment also helped form relationships that remained strong
through his tenure as district attorney.
Among those he worked with were Deputy District Attorneys James
Bascue and Reuben Ortega, who became his top two aides as district
attorney. (Both later were appointed to the bench and are now
retired, Bascue from the Superior Court and Ortega from the Court of
Appeal.)
Ortega, who had left the office to go into private practice and later
became a Los Angeles Superior Court commissioner, says he was `very
reluctant’ to give up that job for what might be a short stint as a
top administrator, but that Philibosian was `very persuasive.’
Ortega explains that he `loved the commissioner’s job’ and `loved
juvenile court,’ but that he made the right decision:
`It was a fascinating and educational two years. I’ll tell you, I
never worked so hard in my life. I learned a lot from the experience
and from him and I got to see how he took command of that office.’
He added that he is `forever grateful’ to Philibosian for helping
launch his judicial career by recommending him to Deukmejian for
appointment as a Superior Court judge. He was sworn in the day
Philibosian left office and was elevated to the Court of Appeal two
years later.
Trial Experience
After East Los Angeles, Philibosian went to Norwalk and Santa Monica,
where he says he gained tremendous experience trying cases before a
pair of veteran judges, both now deceased. One was Laurence
Rittenband – who is remembered primarily for having sentenced film
director Roman Polanski to 50 years in prison for having sex with
underaged girls, turning him into an exile – and the other was Edward
Brand, `a very tough guy’ who carried a .38 snub-nosed revolver under
his robes, Philibosian remembers.
He eventually was promoted to head deputy in the Van Nuys office. He
also stepped up his political involvement, volunteering for two
statewide campaigns in 1978.
One was that of Younger, who had been promoted from district attorney
to state attorney general eight years earlier and was trying to
unseat Gov. Jerry Brown. The other candidate was a state senator from
Long Beach named George Deukmejian, who wanted to succeed Younger as
attorney general.
Much has been made of the fact that Philibosian and Deukmejian share
an Armenian heritage, but that was a `totally minor’ factor in their
relationship, Philibosian explains. They did not live in the same
community – Philibosian lived in Westwood for a while and settled in
the San Fernando Valley in 1969 – and the younger man had played only a
small role in Deukmejian’s winning campaign because he was spending
more of his time on Younger’s losing one.
Deukmejian nonetheless gave him an important assignment, naming him
chief assistant attorney general in charge of the criminal side of
the office. The new attorney general – who had authored a good deal of
criminal justice legislation, including an initiative to restore the
death penalty in the state – wanted the office to have `a more
prosecutorial attitude’ toward criminal cases, Philibosian explains,
and picked him because of his experience as a prosecutor who had
tried a lot of cases and also had administrative experience.
Deukmejian agrees, saying Philibosian did a `tremendous’ job in
heading up the division. Philibosian has accomplished much, he said,
because he is `very bright, collegial, and resourceful.’
After Brown launched an ill-fated U.S. Senate run in 1982 rather than
seeking a third term as governor, Deukmejian ran to succeed him. It
was a difficult decision for him, Philibosian says, because the
Attorney General’s Office `had accomplished a lot’ and because he was
concerned about what would happen to his staff if he lost.
Philibosian says he had no doubt which way his boss should go.
`I said `Duke, you’ve got to run for governor,’ ‘ assuring him that
if need be, `we’ll all go out and find jobs.’ The strongest argument,
he comments, was that as governor, he could reverse the trend of
liberal judicial appointments under Brown.
Deukmejian won a narrow victory over then-Los Angeles Mayor Tom
Bradley and became governor. That meant a short-term promotion for
Philibosian, who was named to replace the chief deputy, Michael
Franchetti, who left the office right after the election to work on
the governor-elect’s transition team and went on to become the new
governor’s finance director.
Philibosian, meanwhile, was working on his next job.
Van de Kamp Moves On
District Attorney John Van de Kamp, a Democrat, had won election as
attorney general, defeating Republican George Nicholson, then a
colleague of Philibosian’s in the Attorney General’s Office and now a
Third District Court of Appeal justice. The result was widely
expected, and there was much speculation as to whom the Board of
Supervisors might select to serve the last two years of Van de Kamp’s
term as district attorney.
Philibosian wanted the job, but hadn’t let his interest become known
publicly, out of loyalty to Nicholson.
`I didn’t want to give signals that I didn’t expect him to win,’
Philibosian explains. But once the election results were in, he told
a television reporter at Deukmejian’s victory party that he was going
to seek the appointment.
To become district attorney, somebody needed to get three votes from
among the five supervisors – Republicans Michael Antonovich, Deane
Dana, and Pete Schabarum, and Democrats Kenneth Hahn and Ed Edelman.
(Dana and Hahn are now deceased, Schabarum and Edelman are retired
from elective politics, and Antonovich remains on the board.) Dana
`became my champion,’ Philibosian relates.
Antonovich backed M. David Stirling, with whom he had served in the
state Assembly and who later became chief deputy attorney general
under Dan Lungren; Edelman supported Stephen Trott, then U.S.
attorney for the Central District of California and now a senior
judge of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals; Hahn supported
Johnnie Cochran Jr., Van de Kamp’s assistant district attorney.
Schabarum, who hadn’t made his choice known in advance, gave
Philibosian his second vote.
Hahn’s backing of Cochran made perfect sense because Hahn – `one of the
greatest political strategists of all time,’ Philibosian says
admiringly – represented the district with the largest concentration of
African Americans and Cochran would have been the first black
district attorney in the county’s history.
Cochran, Philibosian posits, `liked being in the mix but didn’t
seriously want to be district attorney,’ instead being headed toward
lucrative private practice. After the first ballot, Hahn cast the
decisive vote for Philibosian, even though the two really didn’t know
each other.
`He just kind of adopted me,’ Philibosian explains. The relationship
cut both ways, as Philibosian supported the supervisor and his son
James K. Hahn in their subsequent campaigns.
Current Supervisor Don Knabe, who was Dana’s chief deputy at the
time, had been designated to guide Philibosian through the process
and recalls `some very anxious moments’ during the selection meeting.
`He was literally in my office with the door closed,’ Knabe recalls,
listening to the meeting over the `squawk box.’ Not only was there
uncertainty as to what Schabarum would do, and what Hahn would do
beyond his initial vote for Cochran, it was still possible that the
board would postpone a final decision, and even search for additional
candidates.
Ultimately, he remembers, the vote was made unanimous. All five
supervisors, he says, `were very comfortable with Bob’ and had `a
great working relationship’ with him in the two years he served.
Philibosian, he added, `has done a great job’ for the county through
his service on the Economy and Efficiency Commission.
Philibosian recalls his time as district attorney fondly, although he
had no illusions about the difficulty he was going to face in keeping
the job, with little recognition among voters in the huge county, and
a need to raise a lot of money in a short time for an election
campaign.
He vowed, however, that he was `not going to worry about the
politics’ but was going to do the job as best he could. `I did the
job, and loved every minute of it,’ he says, taking credit for
beefing up the office’s efforts in toxic waste disposal,
environmental law, consumer law, and antitrust enforcement;
centralizing narcotics prosecutions – an idea he attributes to a young
deputy named Steve Cooley – and directing an active legislative
program.
He accomplished much in a short time, he says, because he surrounded
himself with top people.
`The secret of any executive is to have a good staff,’ a lesson he
says he learned under Deukmejian. He filled top positions in the
office with longtime colleagues Bascue and Ortega; Billy Webb, who
had been calendar deputy in Rittenband’s court while Philibosian was
the trial deputy; Van de Kamp holdover Curt Livesay; and budget
expert Joan Ouderkirk, whom he hired away from the county chief
administrative officer and who was married at the time to John
Ouderkirk, then a deputy district attorney and later a Los Angeles
Superior Court judge.
Antonovich, the lone remaining board member from that time, told the
MetNews that he and Philibosian became good friends, and that his
performance as district attorney was `superb,’ elaborating:
`He was tough on drug dealers, and strongly enforced child abuse and
child predator laws….Bob is a hard-working and principled public
servant who has dedicated his life to public service and the
furtherance of justice.’
His tenure as district attorney, however, was a short one, as the
June 1984 primary election forced him to face what he calls `a
perfect political storm against me.’
He was a first-time candidate; opponent Ira Reiner had won two
elections for Los Angeles city controller and two for city attorney.
While the election was officially nonpartisan, he was a Republican
running in a heavily Democratic county in an election in which
Democrats turned out in large numbers because of a hotly contested
presidential primary while Republicans largely stayed home because
President Reagan’s re-nomination was certain; and those Democrats
were getting mailers urging a vote for Reiner and giving both
candidates’ party affiliations.
`Very Smooth’ Transition
Reiner won by a good-sized margin and took office later that year.
Philibosian made what he recalls as a `very smooth’ transition to
private practice, joining an old-line Los Angeles firm, MacDonald,
Halstead and Laybourne – which later merged into the international
mega-firm of Baker & McKenzie – and primarily practiced government and
regulatory law.
He joined Sheppard Mullin in 1994, after Baker & McKenzie closed the
Los Angeles office. `I wasn’t going to leave for San Francisco, or
San Diego, or D.C.’ in order to remain a partner at Baker & McKenzie,
he explains.
He has no regrets, he says, because Sheppard Mullin has remained a
great place to work, maintaining a friendly and collegial atmosphere
even as it has opened more offices, including one in Shanghai, and
grown to 500 lawyers. He continues to focus on public law,
specializing in land use and state and local regulatory law,
including Coastal Commission and beverage licensing issues.
He has largely stayed away from criminal law, although he has been
involved in a few white-collar cases. He raised some eyebrows,
though, last year when he showed up on the team of lawyers
representing heiress Paris Hilton in her drunk driving/violation of
probation case.
Philibosian explains that he and his firm had not otherwise
represented Hilton or her business interests or those of her family,
but that he was brought into the case strictly to argue the issue of
the sheriff’s authority, as the public officer responsible for
alleviating jail overcrowding, to release inmates early. He still
believes that Sheriff Lee Baca acted appropriately, he says, but the
trial judge disagreed and Hilton chose not to appeal.
While he has not run for public office since losing to Reiner – he did
serve two elective terms in party office, as a member of the Los
Angeles County Republican Central Committee – he certainly never left
the arena. In fact, not long after completing his tenure as district
attorney, he embarked on a campaign the reverberations of which are
still felt today.
The California Supreme Court in 1986 had a decidedly liberal stamp.
It consistently overturned death sentences, and constantly upset many
in business with its rulings on labor and regulatory issues.
But that course turned after Chief Justice Rose Elizabeth Bird and
Justices Cruz Reynoso and Joseph Grodin were ousted by the voters in
November 1986, giving Deukmejian the opportunity to appoint their
successors.
Philibosian was in the forefront of the campaign, which brought
together well-heeled business interests, the GOP, and victims’ rights
groups, using capital punishment as a signature issue.
Of the four Democratic justices on the ballot that year, only Stanley
Mosk – who went on to become the longest-serving justice in California
history before his death in 2001 – survived.
Squelches Mosk Challenge
As Philibosian tells it, there was a group within the anti-Bird
coalition – he declines to name names – who wanted to target Mosk as
well. `I and a number of other people squelched it,’ he explains,
believing that it was neither right nor smart to go after the court’s
senior justice, a politically adroit fixture of California public
life for 40 years.
While Mosk shared a party affiliation with the others, and sided
with them much of the time when it came to deciding cases, he was
very different, particularly from the chief justice, Philibosian
explains.
Bird, who died in 1999, `was not a good lawyer, not a hard worker,
and an ideologue, so she was the opposite of Stanley Mosk,’ he says.
He relates a conversation he had with Richard Mosk, the justice’s
son, and now a justice of this district’s Court of Appeal. The
younger Mosk invited him to lunch, but Philibosian invited him to
`save the time’ and assured him that he was doing everything he could
to keep the senior Mosk out of the opposition’s sights.
Richard Mosk confirms that Philibosian was helpful in the effort, for
which he and his father were `extremely grateful.’ Mosk adds that `my
father admired people like Bob’ who were willing to espouse differing
views while maintaining a professional respect.
Philibosian accepts the conventional wisdom that had Brown elevated
Mosk to chief justice, and then appointed Bird, who had no prior
judicial experience, as Mosk’s successor, the liberal majority would
likely have withstood the 1986 election.
Brown, he says, made a `a fatal strategic error’ that `literally
changed the course of history in California.’ The defeat of the
three, and the appointments of more conservative justices by
successive governors, have produced a `great’ court, he says.
Philibosian’s own role in the campaign became an issue, he relates,
when Bird spread a rumor that Deukmejian planned to appoint
Philibosian as chief justice.
An unnamed person who had discussed the matter with Bird, Philibosian
says, attributed to her the comment that if Philibosian became the
next occupant of her chambers, he planned to replace the macramé
plant hangings in her office with nooses.
The claim that he was after her job for himself `had no basis
whatsoever,’ he says, because he was quite happy at his law firm, and
because Bird had exemplified the problems of having a chief justice
with no judicial experience.
In the ensuing years, he has served in a variety of part-time public
and political posts, including as chairman of the county Economy and
Efficiency Commission, the California Commission on Criminal Justice,
and the California World Trade Commission.
And while he says he does not have the close relationship with the
current governor that he had with Deukmejian and Pete Wilson, whom he
advised on judicial appointments and other matters, he is one of
Arnold Schwarzenegger’s appointees to the state Republican Central
Committee.
His present political project, he says, is helping reelect Cooley,
`one of my oldest and dearest friends.’
His practice and his outside activities leave little time for
recreation, he acknowledges, but he says he spends as much time as he
can with his family. He and Nancy Philibosian have been married for
nearly four decades, and have two children.
His son, also Robert Philibosian, is married to the daughter of a
onetime courtroom adversary of the ex-prosecutor, the late Charles
English, who was a leading criminal defense lawyer. His daughter,
Janet Philibosian, is a part-time Monrovia attorney, the mother of
his two grandchildren, and the wife of Craig Valenzuela, a member of
the Los Angeles Police Department.
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