SEX CRIMES
A Kiss Is Still a Kiss, but a Grope
Can Be a Felony
What if Bill Clinton were a lowly worker's
compensation judge?
BY JAMES TARANTO
The Wall Street Journal, Thursday, March 19, 1998
"This is not just sexual harassment," Patricia Ireland, president of the National Organization for Women, said Sunday of Kathleen Willey's story. "If it's true, it's sexual assault." Ms. Ireland added, however: "It's extremely unlikely that a prosecutor would take that kind of case to court."
Tell that to Stanley Feinstein, a 65-year-old former worker's compensation judge from Los Angeles. Three years ago, Mr. Feinstein was convicted of felony sexual battery in a case that eerily echoes President Clinton's current adultery-and-assault scandals.
On March 28, 1994, then-Judge Feinstein met in his chambers with a female lawyer who had business before his court. According to the lawyer, Judge Feinstein pushed her against a wall, grabbed her breast and forcibly kissed her.
Six days later Judge Feinstein surrendered to police, after learning a warrant had been issued for his arrest. He was charged with false imprisonment and sexual battery, both felonies. In short order, the California Department of Industrial Relations, which oversees the workers' compensation court, removed him from the bench--not for sexual wrongdoing but for refusing to cooperate with the department's internal investigation. "Even though he is innocent, he didn't want to compromise his rights in the criminal case," Mr. Feinstein's lawyer, Philip Israels, told the Los Angeles Times. "We said we'd cooperate fully, but to let us take care of the criminal matter first." Mike McCurry couldn't have said it better.
Judge Feinstein, for his own part, declared himself the innocent victim of a political conspiracy, orchestrated by lawyers unhappy with his rulings. (Unlike Mr. Clinton, however, he made the case himself, rather than delegate the job to his wife.) "They are using me to send a message," he told the Times the day of his arrest. "The message is: If you don't do what we want in the workers' compensation system, we will find you, and we will get you. There has been a history of attacks against workers' compensation judges."
Asked by the Times why this woman would file a complaint, the judge seemed, well, bewildered: "You have to go into their minds and find out why they are doing this." Later Mr. Feinstein's lawyers claimed she was out for money, filing a false police report in preparation for a civil lawsuit.
In a preliminary hearing, Municipal Court Judge Mary Waters reduced the charges to misdemeanors, but prosecutors were determined to try Mr. Feinstein on the more serious charges. They asked a judge of the California Superior Court, one Lance Ito, to reinstate the felony charges; he refused. But the California Court of Appeal saw things the prosecutors' way and overruled Judges Waters and Ito. In April 1995 Mr. Feinstein went before a jury.
Although the defendant did not take the stand, the jurors did get to hear from him--on tape. The day after their initial encounter, Judge Feinstein's accuser had visited his chambers again. On the advice of the Los Angeles Police Department, she was wearing a wire.
On the tape, the accuser told Judge Feinstein that she was "freaked out about what happened yesterday." He replied: "I will not do anything like that again," and added, "I assure you, if you ever appear before me, you will be treated decently."
The jury convicted Mr. Feinstein of the battery charge, carrying a maximum penalty of four years in prison. Owing to his age and lack of prior convictions, prosecutors asked for only a six-month jail term. But Superior Court Judge Darlene Schempp sentenced him to twice that. "When a judge abuses trust, a serious punishment is appropriate," she said in court, quoting a Los Angeles Times editorial.
She refused to release him on bail while he appealed the conviction. So he went to the Los Angeles County Jail's special ward for high-risk inmates; Lyle Menendez was in the next cell, awaiting retrial on charges of murdering his parents. He spent a month there, whereupon he was released, for reasons he does not know and the Los Angeles County Probation Department, citing confidentiality laws, will not disclose.
Mr. Feinstein appealed the verdict and lost. The accuser also filed a civil suit, which he settled for "about $30,000." In an interview yesterday, he maintained his innocence, blaming his "harsh treatment" on the Times editorial Judge Schempp quoted in sentencing him.
When I first heard about this case, it struck me as an example of prosecutors gone mad. (Full disclosure: Mr. Feinstein's son is a friend of mine.) The behavior alleged certainly was piggish and unprofessional, good cause for ostracism and removal from the bench. But felony prosecution and imprisonment seemed to me wildly excessive.
The jury didn't see it that way, however. Juror Jeanne Wiczek of Northridge told the Los Angeles Daily News: "Someone in his position should know better."
It's a good point--and one that applies all the more forcefully to the president of the United States.
Next article: Who's a Hypocrite--and Who Cares? (8/4/98)