For the third time, a judge who became entangled in the ethical issues involving a Mediterranean cruise arranged by trial attorneys for 11 active and retired judges apparently will lose or surrender his role in a case.
Previously, two judges who went on the cruise--Pasadena Superior Court Presiding Judge Coleman Swart and private judge Jack Goertzen--removed themselves from cases when questions were raised about their relationship with prominent Los Angeles attorney Thomas V. Girardi, an organizer of the cruise.
At issue now is whether Keith Wisot, a private judge who looked into the cruise in his role as an administrator for a private judging organization, should remain as a court-appointed discovery referee in a case involving Pacific Gas & Electric.
The cruise last August was organized by two attorneys, Girardi and Walter J. Lack, who had the year before won a $333-million settlement in the first phase of a toxic pollution case against PG&E filed by hundreds of plaintiffs who blamed the utility for ground water contamination. The lawyers collected a fee of about $120 million.
Three of the five private judges who served as arbitrators or mediators in that first phase--Goertzen, John Trotter and Jack Tenner--went on the discount cruise for 90 people on the Cunard liner Sea Goddess II out of Monte Carlo. All said they paid or intended to pay $3,070 each for themselves and a like amount for their wives. The cruise included other lawyers, doctors and expert witnesses.
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Wisot, in his capacity with the Judicial Arbitration and Mediation Service (JAMS), cooperated with a Times request for information about the cruise, saying there was nothing unethical about the participation of the judges.
But Wisot also is serving as a court-appointed discovery referee in the second phase of the PG&E case. As a result, PG&E attorneys challenged his potential impartiality. At the same time, for other reasons, attorneys for the plaintiffs, led by Girardi, also asked that he be removed.
A three-judge panel of the state Court of Appeal agreed. It directed Superior Court Judge Frances Rothchild, who had initially refused to remove Wisot, to change judges or show cause as to why Wisot should not be removed. Legal experts familiar with the debate predicted Tuesday that Wisot will lose his referee's position.
The Court of Appeal also ordered the unsealing of a confidential report by Wisot to JAMS general counsel Michael Young detailing his inquiry, his contacts with The Times and the judges.
