A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge on Tuesday postponed a scheduling hearing in the lawsuit Pasadena Unified School District Board President Tina Fredericks filed to stop a recall petition against her, moving the matter to Oct. 13.
The delay leaves Fredericks’ request that the court bar Los Angeles County election officials from allowing the petition to circulate unresolved for another five weeks.
The Committee to Protect PUSD Schools, which is organizing the recall, said after the hearing that it would continue to organize, speak and circulate petitions.
Fredericks filed the lawsuit July 2, naming the county registrar-recorder and 124 unidentified “Doe” defendants. The lawsuit sought to stop circulation of the recall petition and ultimately have it declared invalid.
Fredericks is acting as her own lawyer.
An amended filing was served on the registrar-recorder Sept. 4, the Friday before the Labor Day weekend and four days before the scheduled court proceeding. The amendment removed the 124 unnamed defendants from the case.
The figure matched the number of District 6 residents who signed the notice of intention to circulate the recall petition, according to the original filing, thus leading recall proponents to conclude Fredericks intended to include each of them in her suit.
Fredericks told Pasadena Now that she never intended to sue the recall organizers and they had been identified in the original filing by error.
The committee argued that removing the unnamed defendants did not alter the purpose of the original lawsuit.
“The fact that the ‘Does’ have now been removed does not change what the original filing sought to accomplish: to halt the recall process through a legal challenge,” the committee statement said.
Recall organizers said they would continue collecting signatures and campaigning to place the issue before voters while the lawsuit proceeds.
“Recall proponents have the right to organize, speak, circulate petitions and ask voters to decide whether an elected official should remain in office,” the committee said. “The question should ultimately be decided by the voters, not by the person facing the recall and not by an effort to stop the electoral process before voters have their say.”
The Oct. 13 conference is a scheduling proceeding, not a trial. Judges use trial-setting conferences to determine whether a case is ready for the trial calendar and to work out the structure of any future trial, including whether it would be heard by a jury or by the judge. Testimony on the merits is not normally taken.
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