Judge won't dismiss Phil Spector legal fee dispute

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A jury should decide whether imprisoned record producer Phil Spector should be refunded $1 million he paid to his former criminal defense attorney after his 2003 arrest, a judge ruled Tuesday.

Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Malcolm Mackey rejected a bid by Robert Shapiro's lawyers to have Spector's claims dismissed, saying it would be up to jurors to decide whether the fee was nonrefundable.

The producer and Shapiro, who was a member of O.J. Simpson's defense team, have been sparring over the money for years, with Spector contending Shapiro took advantage of him while he was facing charges for shooting a woman at his mansion. Shapiro has countered that it was clear that the fee was nonrefundable.

Shapiro did the equivalent of $186,000 hours of work on the case, his attorney said, but that didn't matter because the agreement he signed with Spector guaranteed him the $1 million.

Mackey pointedly questioned Shapiro's attorney Tuesday, asking whether the "Wall of Sound" producer received enough of Shapiro's services to warrant the fee.

"You think a million dollars worth of services was done here?" Mackey asked attorney Joel Klevens.

"Absolutely," the attorney responded, noting that Shapiro secured Spector's release on bail and that he remained free until his 2009 conviction.

Klevens also said Shapiro retained a group of experts "that no one else could have assembled." He noted that Spector used 10 attorneys to handle his case between his arrest and his second trial, which ended with the producer being convicted of second-degree murder in the death of Lana Clarkson.

Renowned for his work with musicians such as The Beatles, The Righteous Brothers and The Ronettes, Spector is now serving 19 years to life in state prison. He is appealing his conviction.

His attorney, Michael Dempsey, said he would like to have his client testify if the case goes to trial in March, but said that would be difficult.

"We think he'll pay much better to the jury than Shapiro," Dempsey said.

Klevens faulted Spector for hiring and firing so many attorneys, and said during the hearing that the record producer might not have been convicted if he "had not been a little bit looney."

Klevens declined to comment on Tuesday's ruling.

K-Rod’s Taking One For His Mother

His season in hell has taken a twist or two since Francisco Rodriguez's only too-well publicized arrest and, it turned out, decommissioning for the season thanks to a torn ligament incurred while punching out his common-law wife's father. The twists only begin with Rodriguez ducking time in the calaboose.

A judge ruled against jail despite K-Rod's having sent the lady some 56 text messages, most of which prodded for a reconciliation of sorts, several of which accused her family of manipulating her while exploiting his baseball wealth, and all of which violated a court restraining order.

He returned to court Tuesday, slapped with a fresh charge of criminal contempt piling onto the mess that has already put his life with the New York Mets in serious jeopardy. He left court with the understanding that he would see the inside of a cell if he violated it again.

A few further details of the post-11 August loss (to the Colorado Rockies) outburst that started the whole mess in the first place have seeped forth. It may have been one thing for a temperamental pitcher coming off a bad outing to deck his common-law father-in-law, the grandfather of his children, after the older man ordered him to man up and pitch better. But it may have been something else again if Rodriguez swung in defense of his mother, who also happened to be in the Citi Field family room on the night in question.

Rodriguez hadn't taken his lumps in that game — he wasn't even in the game. There has since been whispering that, while the rest of the club had pretty much surrendered hope after the All-Star Break, held their tongues, and put on a professional face that some might consider an unrealistic mask, it still got to Rodriguez — who spent most of his pre-Mets career going where few of his teammates have gone before (the postseason, that is) — a little more deeply.

But he returned to the clubhouse after that loss and, when Carlos Pena (no known relation to the ballplayer of the same name) jabbed at him verbally, Rodriguez's mother stood up for her son, admirably enough. According to the New York Daily News, it was when Pena ordered the woman to shut up that K-Rod lost it entirely.

He thundered to the old man that neither he nor anyone else talks to his mamithat way, and proceeded to support that assertion with a shot in the head.

No one pretends Rodriguez has lacked for issues of self control since he signed with the Mets, after a distinguished, record-setting career with the Los Angeles Angels that only began when he came up, seemingly from nowhere, and made his bones as a postseason assassin during the Angels' staggering run to their first World Series ring almost a decade ago.

But even the least composed of men would seem to have a right to stand up for his mother. It's one thing to get into your own grille over a night on the job that isn't quite the kind of night for which you earn your keep, but it's something else again to get into your mother's grille when she's doing precisely what you would do yourself, once hopes, should it be your child under siege.

These are times in which even parents get thrown under the proverbial bus when their children find themselves cornered and desperate. Issues though he has, there is something disturbingly admirable about the idea that Francisco Rodriguez might have put everything he has on the line and maybe even thought, subconsciously, the hell with all that, on behalf of sticking up for his mami.

For a little perspective, compare Rodriguez's scenario to this: Three Metsdidn't join the team when they visited Walter Reed Army Medical Center during the Mets' recent stand against the Washington Nationals. These are the reported reasons: Luis Castillo said he gets squeamish in the hospital; Carlos Beltran begged off because he was already committed to a meeting involving a Puerto Rican high school he's building; Oliver Perez simply replied that it was none of anyone's business why he didn't go.

Those three may not lose half of what Rodriguez stands to lose, on or off the field, whether or not they remain Mets beyond this season. (Pace Mike Lupica, it is reasonable to assume that a man who'd stand up for his mami, even against his common-law father-in-law, is a man who would not be squeamish, prior committed, or otherwise talked out of visiting the wounded in a military hospital were he allowed to continue team activities.)

In theory, K-Rod can recover his reputation and his career with only a few small contortions, depending on what becomes of the Mets' bid to convert his contract to non-guaranteed or the Players' Association's bid to thwart the Mets. Recovering his household may prove a lot more arduous.

His estranged common-law wife and her father have legal counsel, and enough of the drift of the now-contentious text messages expressed Rodriguez's anxiety that he has lost his children. If the Daily News has the background right, he would be something less than human if he wasn't trying to reconcile the peculiar idea that standing up for your mother can cost you your children.

Judge Orders Man Freed in a Three-Strikes Case

The case has been widely cited by those pushing to change the law, including civil rights activists and the Los Angeles district attorney, as an example of the kind of heavy-handed sentencing it can lead to.

Judge Peter Espinoza of Superior Court, who ordered the release, said convictions under the three-strikes law — which calls for heavy sentences for a third conviction — had often brought "disproportionate" sentences and "resulted in if not unintended, then at least unanticipated, consequences."

Several of Mr. Taylor's relatives attended his hearing Monday afternoon.

Mr. Taylor, 48, is one of 14 California inmates who have been resentenced since students working on the Three Strikes Project at the Criminal Defense Clinic at Stanford Law School began reviewing cases in 2007, said Michael Romano, a law professor who helped found the clinic.

Gov. Pete Wilson signed the law in 1994. Twenty-four states have similar laws, according to the Sentencing Project, a national defense advocacy group.

In 1997, Mr. Taylor was homeless and sleeping at a church in downtown Los Angeles. One night, he tried to pry open the doors of the soup kitchen there because he was hungry, he told the police at the time. Judge James Dunn sentenced him to 25 years to life under the three-strikes law. In 1984 and 1985, Mr. Taylor had committed two robberies to support his crack cocaine and heroin addictions. He had no weapons during those robberies, and nobody was injured, according to case records.

Law students are reviewing about 20 more three-strikes cases, said Reiko Rogozen, a student who worked on the Taylor case. The cases are chosen based on letters from inmates, or are selected from a list presented by District Attorney Steve Cooley of Los Angeles as some of the harshest sentences under the law. Mr. Cooley often spoke of Mr. Taylor's case in his 2000 campaign for district attorney against Gil Garcetti, who supported the law.

"Some have come off that list because we know Cooley may be sympathetic to those," said Gabriel Martinez, who worked on Mr. Taylor's case. "We want to start influencing case law and hopefully the overall policy so it no longer gives life sentences for nonviolent offenses."

On Monday, Mr. Taylor's relatives erupted in applause after Judge Espinoza ordered that he be released for time served. Ms. Rogozen put a hand on Mr. Taylor's shoulder. He nodded and said quietly, "Thank you for giving me another chance."