Jury Decides Antonovich Didn’t Defame Ex-Supervisor : Courts: Jurors later said they did not believe the incumbent board member had maliciously accused Baxter Ward of removing 5th District office files in 1980.

Los Angeles County Supervisor Mike Antonovich on Friday won his third victory over former Supervisor Baxter Ward, this time in the courtroom.

A San Fernando Superior Court jury took less than three hours to decide that Antonovich did not defame Ward during the 1988 election, when Antonovich charged that Ward had removed or destroyed 5th District office files eight years earlier.

When asked by the court clerk, the members of the seven-woman, five-man jury stated they did not believe that Antonovich knew his statements were false or that he was making the claims with reckless disregard for the truth.

After the verdict was read, Antonovich walked across the courtroom and shook Ward’s hand, but the two men did not exchange words.

Ward, who was unseated by Antonovich in 1980 and defeated in a rematch in 1988, would comment only briefly outside the courtroom, saying he was disappointed.

He said he thought that records he had produced during the six-day civil trial indicating that 177 boxes of his office files were in a county storage area a year after he left office proved that he had not removed any files. Ward, who served as his own lawyer, said he also thought he had proved that Antonovich knew or could have known that Ward had not done so.

But jurors interviewed outside the courtroom said that was not enough evidence to prove that Antonovich knew what had happened to the files, or that he had maliciously accused Ward of taking them.

“Basically, we couldn’t determine what happened to the files,” said juror Stephen Poling, a chemist from Arleta.

The jurors, however, said they sympathized with Ward’s effort to clear his name.

“We didn’t find Ward guilty of taking the files either,” said jury forewoman Marion Ziegler, a high school office administrator from San Fernando.

During the trial, several county employees testified that Ward’s boxes were transferred to storage, then routinely destroyed in 1986. But no one could say who ordered the files moved to storage or from where.

Ziegler said she was frustrated by that testimony because it appeared that no one in county government knew what was going on or was willing to accept responsibility.

“No one seems to know what the other person is doing. It’s nobody’s job,” she said. “As a taxpayer, I resent that.”

Another juror, Felice Butler, a legal secretary from Sylmar, said she didn’t think the matter should have even been brought to trial.

Antonovich tried twice to have the case thrown out, but both the Superior Court and state appellate court ruled that a jury should decide the matter.

Superior Court Judge David M. Schacter, who presided over the case, said a trial was necessary because of the way the defamation law is written. Schacter said as long as there is a question of fact--in this case whether Antonovich knew the statement was false and said it recklessly--then it must be decided by a jury.

Outside the courtroom, Antonovich said the trial had been a waste of court time, and reiterated his position that the matter was political and not a criminal or legal issue.