Discussions continue between the defense and prosecution on a possible deal. There is a new prosecutor for the case.
By Jonathan Friedman / Assistant Editor
The arraignment hearing for Corral Fire suspects Eric Matthew Ullman and Dean Allen Lavorante was continued Thursday morning to Oct. 3 in Van Nuys Superior Court. The Culver City residents’ arraignment has been delayed several times this year.
The reason for this continuance is because Deputy District Attorney Shelly Samuels was working at a trial in the Antelope Valley. Samuels was recently assigned to the Corral Fire case after prosecutor Anne Ambrose was removed. Sources say Ambrose left the case because she recently became pregnant. Samuels is the third prosecutor to be assigned to this case. The original prosecutor was Samuel Dordulian, who left earlier this year to enter private practice.
“This was not some sort of great meaningful thing,” Lavorante’s attorney, Ben W. Pesta II, said after the court session about the continuance. “I wouldn’t attach anything to it.”
Pesta said he and Mark Werksman, Ullman’s attorney, continue to have discussions with the District Attorney’s Office about a possible deal.
“They have been in good faith on both sides,” Pesta said. He added, “The DA’s Office is looking at this case very carefully. Shelly Samuels is an extremely capable senior prosecutor.”
Pesta said his client and Ullman have a “great difference in culpability” from the other three suspects in the case—Los Angeles residents Brian Allan Anderson, William Thomas Coppock and Brian David Franks. Pesta and Werksman have made similar statements in the past.
“The two cases are like day and night in terms of responsibility,” Werksman said in May. “I think there’s a general recognition that Eric and Dean didn’t do anything wrongful with regard to the fire in Malibu.”
The attorney for Franks said in December his client had less to do with the fire than the other two Los Angeles suspects, and that Franks was the only one of the three who tried to put out the fire that started in the early hours of Nov. 24.
The Los Angeles trio pleaded not guilty in December. The men are scheduled to appear in court on Sept. 26 for a preliminary hearing to determine if there is enough evidence for a trial.
According to a press release issued by the District Attorney’s Office in December, Ullman and Lavorante were the first to appear at an area at the top of Corral Canyon Road known as The Cave in the late hours of Nov. 23. The Los Angeles trio arrived later. A campfire started at the location got out of control in the early hours of Nov. 24 and led to Malibu’s most destructive fire since 1993.
The five suspects are charged with felony counts of recklessly causing a fire with great bodily injury and recklessly causing a fire to an inhabited structure. The District Attorney’s Office says the blaze was started “during and within an area of a state of emergency,” which would require a mandatory state prison sentence if the suspects were convicted. Defense attorneys have argued there was not a state of emergency in effect when the fire began.
The Corral Fire burned 4,900 acres. It destroyed 53 homes, 37 vehicles and a mobile home. Another 45 structures, including 33 homes, were damaged. Six firefighters were injured, including one who received second-degree burns to the face.