Tri-City 7 attorney Ray Artiano tells us his idea of how collusion works

Ray James Artiano is a partner at Stutz, Artiano Shinoff & Holtz.

OCEANSIDE: Judge deflects request for deeper testimony from four Tri-City board members
PAUL SISSON
September 30, 2009

Lawyers will not get to interview four Tri-City hospital directors about the contents of private meetings that led to putting hospital executives on leave nearly one year ago, according to a Superior Court ruling released Wednesday.

In one of several pending lawsuits, seven fired hospital executives allege that four Tri-City board members violated public open-meetings law by getting together illegally, outside any formal meeting, to lay plans that were later approved in a special meeting Dec. 18 when the board put eight top-level executives, including CEO Arthur Gonzalez, on paid leave.

Lawyers for the sidelined and later fired executives allege in their lawsuits that the four directors violated public-meetings law by getting together privately with attorney Julie Biggs in November to discuss ousting hospital leadership. The law forbids a majority of elected officials from discussing public business outside of a public venue.

Though the executives' lawyers have interviewed the four board members under oath about the Dec. 18 meeting, each has refused to say anything about any previous private meetings.

In a short ruling, filed Tuesday but released Wednesday, Judge Thomas P. Nugent, citing attorney-client privilege, refused to order directors Kathleen Sterling, RoseMarie Reno, Charlene Anderson and George Coulter to talk about the private meetings.

Tom Tosdal, the attorney who represents Sterling, said Wednesday that he was confident all along that attorney-client privilege was adequate to keep the directors from having to testify about the early meetings, even though Biggs had not yet been hired by the board or by any of its individual members.

"Under the law, if a person consults with an attorney for the purpose of getting legal advice, even if the attorney isn't ultimately retained, it's privileged," Tosdal said.

Ray Artiano, an attorney who represents the executives, said he disagreed with the judge's decision but quickly found a silver lining. He said that by asserting attorney-client privilege, the four board members stop themselves from claiming that any actions they took were on the advice of a lawyer, without waiving their privilege.

Artiano said the mere fact that Biggs and investigator Michael Williams were present at the Dec. 18 meeting suggests collusion.

"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what they were talking about," Artiano said. "These people (Biggs and Williams) didn't just show up at the meeting on Dec. 18 just by serendipity."