D.A. calls jury-hiring unheard of

Deepa Bharath

The move by defense attorneys in a high-profile gang-rape case to

hire members of a jury that deadlocked during the first trial is

“outrageous,” Orange County District Attorney Tony Rackauckas said

Monday.

Prosecutors say 19-year-old Greg Haidl, son of Orange County

Assistant Sheriff Don Haidl and two others, Kyle Nachreiner and Keith

Spann, also 19, raped an unconscious 16-year-old girl and sexually

assaulted her with various objects at the assistant sheriff’s Corona

del Mar home.

The six-week jury trial ended in a mistrial last month. The

district attorney refiled the case the very next day.

Defense attorneys said Sunday they will likely hire 10 jurors at

$50 a hour as consultants to help them prepare for the retrial.

Rackauckas said such strategy is unheard of.

“I’ve been handling criminal cases for 30 years,” he said. “I’ve

been a judge. But I’ve never seen or heard of a defense team hiring

jurors.”

It’s a display of wealth and power by the defense backed up by the

assistant sheriff, Rackauckas said.

“It’s like trying to set a different standard for people with

money,” he said. “They’re trying to send a message to the new jury

that you can get on Haidl’s payroll after the trial.”

Greg Haidl’s former attorney, Joseph Cavallo, who has withdrawn

from the retrial, said if jurors sign the contract, prosecutors will

have to approach defense attorneys if they want to talk to the

jurors.

Rackauckas said that is not true.

“If we want to talk to jurors, we can definitely do so,” he said.

“It will be up to the jurors to talk. But I don’t see us trying to go

out of the way to talk to them, now that they’ve gone on the

defense’s payroll.”

Howard Varinsky, an Emeryville-based trial consultant who has

worked on many high-profile cases, said the Haidl defense is making a

rare, yet smart move.

“It’s like a focus group with the jurors,” said Varinsky, who

advised prosecutors in the Martha Stewart and Scott Peterson cases.

“You could learn a tremendous amount of information and conduct

in-depth interviews. You could build up an accurate picture of how

they reacted to the trial events, from opening statements to key

witnesses and the evidence itself. Attorneys could learn how

persuasive their arguments really were.”

Why, then, is it not common practice?

“Money,” Varinsky said. “It’s not cheap to do something like

that.”

Greg Haidl was arrested on a misdemeanor statutory rape charge on

Thursday. Prosecutors say he had sex with a 16-year-old girl he met

during a party his father threw in his Spyglass Hill home the night

of the mistrial.

Prosecutors are also asking that Haidl’s bail be revoked, saying

that he is a flight risk and a danger to society. A hearing has been

scheduled for Friday at 2 p.m. at the Central Justice Center in Santa

Ana.

* DEEPA BHARATH covers public safety and courts. She may be

reached at (949) 574-4226 or by e-mail at deepa.bharath@latimes.com.