Sept. 25 Trial Set for Bugliosi, Shinn
Wednesday, August 28th, 1974
LOS ANGELES, Aug. 28 – Los Angeles County Superior Judge Earl C. Broady Tuesday refused to dismiss perjury charges against attorneys Vincent T. Bugliosi and Daye Shinn, accused of denying under oath they gave information to newsman William Farr despite a gag order during the 1970 Charles Manson murder trial.
Broady scheduled the perjury trial to begin Sept. 25.
Harland Braun, Bugliosi’s lawyer, said he will ask the Court of Appeal to overturn Broady’s decision. He also sought a separate trial for Bugliosi, unsuccessful candidate for district attorney and state attorney general.
Shinn’s attorney, Robert Kirste, said he will decide later whether to join in seeking separate trials and on seeking to overturn Broady’s ruling.
Bugliosi, accompanied to court by his wife, Gail, and law partner, Robert K. Steinberg, made a terse statement to newsmen but directed all questions to Braun.
“I did not give Mr. Farr the transcripts,” the chief prosecutor of Manson said. “We are going to appeal. I think the judge was wrong today.”
He said he expects to he vindicated by the appellate court or by a jury if the matter does go to trial next month.
Shinn had no comment. Both have pleaded innocent.
The attorneys had sought dismissal of the charge on grounds the 1973-74 Los Angele County Grand Jury did not have sufficient evidence on which to base an indictment.
Braun argued that special prosecutor Theodore P. Shield had improperly presented evidence to the grand jury that would not be permitted in a court — transcripts of proceedings before Superior Judge Charles H. Older, comments of persons not under oath and hearsay.
He said the grand jury was never instructed in what evidence they legally could consider and did not understand the criterion necessary to reach an indictment.
Braun also argued unsuccessfully that Shield had not even established that perjury had occurred. He said that Farr refused to testify before the grand jury that he received transcripts of a Manson trial witness’ statement from two of the six trial attorneys, an admission he has made to Older. (All six attorneys have denied under oath giving Farr the transcripts.)
Shield said, however, Farr did acknowledge before the grand jury a transcript of an Older hearing in which he made the two-of-six comments.
(Farr, who spent 46 days in jail for contempt and is scheduled to serve another five-day sentence imposed by Older, has refused to identify the two attorneys, claiming a newsman’s privilege to keep secret his sources.)
Broady agreed with Shield the grand jury had sufficient admissible evidence to reach the indictment, although the judge conceded “there certainly is some incompetent (inadmissible) evidence here.”
Shield said Farr’s two-of-six statement established that perjury had been committed.
The special prosecutor said key evidence leading to Bugliosi’s indictment was the testimony of Dep. Dist. Atty. Stephen Kay, who assisted Bugliosi in the Manson prosecution.
He said that Farr had asked him to give an envelope to Bugliosi one day after he made copies of the statement of witness Virginia Graham. Shield said the grand jury also considered Farr’s and Bugliosi’s testimony on the incident.
The special prosecutor made no comment on Braun’s charge that he had not proved the Virginia Graham statement was in the envelope.
In arriving at the Shinn indictment, Shield said the grand jury used the “process of elimination.” He reiterated that Manson defense attorney Paul Fitzgerald testified he had the court clerk locx up his and the late Ronald Hughes’ copies of the statement, leaving only four in circulation — Bugliosi’s, Shinn’s, Kay’s and defense attorney Irving Kanarek’s.
Shield said Dep. Dist. Atty. Donald Musich, the sixth living lawyer, never had custody of the transcript he shared with Kay. Shield said the evidence connected only Bugliosi and Shinn to the perjury.
By MYRNA OLIVER
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