Amador Superior Court was loaded with attorneys Friday, as Judge David Richmond found himself confronted with a messy, four-way legal battle regarding who would prosecute an upcoming murder case.

The melee that took place during the Oct. 9 hearing had its roots in a different criminal matter several years before. Amador County District Attorney Todd Riebe had prosecuted the late John O'Sullivan for allegedly starving a horse to death. The Irishman pleaded no contest to the charges in return for a delayed entry of judgment awaiting the possibility of dismissal of the charges. In the meantime, O'Sullivan and his wife, Krista Clem, filed a federal lawsuit against Riebe and deputy prosecutor Melinda Aiello.

Before the outcome of that lawsuit could be determined, O'Sullivan was shot to death in a confrontation after evidently driving his tractor onto a neighbor's property. The shooter, Kenneth Zimmerman, maintains the shooting was an act of self-defense. Investigators hold that it was murder.

Questions about who might handle Zimmerman's prosecution emerged in the early hours immediately after O'Sullivan was killed.

At the heart of the matter was O'Sullivan's pending lawsuit against Riebe and the fact that his widow, Krista Clem, didn't want Amador's district attorney involved with the case. The DA's office soon turned to the California Attorney General's Office for guidance. An answer came quickly. The state's top law enforcement agency decided Riebe and his staff should remain in charge of prosecuting Zimmerman, finding that a DA can only be recused if there's a conflict that renders it unlikely that the defendant would receive a fair trial. Since Riebe had no history with Zimmerman, the Attorney General's Office declined to take over the case. "Basically, there's a clear standard that says it's only the defendant, not the victim, that's entitled to ask for a DA to recuse himself," Riebe said in August.

In fact, the defendant's attorneys, Richard Cotta and Kyle Smith, were planning that exact course of action. In early September, they filed their own motion to have Riebe removed from the case on behalf of Zimmerman.

"We're concerned that the existence of the federal lawsuit would have two possible impacts," Cotta said. "One would be that the District Attorney's discretion and objectivity could be affected to the point where he behaved differently. The other has to do with public perception. Even if the DA is not affected, the law says that a trial should be perceived as being just. It doesn't benefit any of the parties involved if the public perceives there's some kind of cloud hanging over the prosecution."

In the meantime, Clem attempted to make legal history by trying to have Riebe subtracted from the case on her own. She did this by having attorney Belinda Harris-Ritter evoke new rights conferred to victims under Marsy's Law. Harris-Ritter filed a notification with the court that she was representing Clem's interest in the proceedings as a victim under Marsy's Law. She then filed a legal brief taking the position that Riebe should be recused as the prosecution authority. Both the DA's office and the Attorney General's Office were strongly opposed to Clem's attempt to have Riebe removed. Ironically, so were the defense attorneys who had filed an actual motion to have Riebe shut out - Cotta and Smith.

Taking the bench at 8:15 a.m., Richmond was charged with sorting through no less than five legal opinions regarding two separate matters: The first was whether Clem had the legal right to impress her wishes on the court; the second was whether the defense could successfully recuse the District Attorney's Office itself.

As the hearing got underway, Deputy District Attorney Steve Hermanson announced he was joining in an objection the defense had filed to stop Clem's involvement in the proceedings. "There is nothing in Marsy's Law that allows victims and their family members to intervene in criminal proceedings," Hermanson commented.

Michael Canzoneri, a representative from the Attorney General's Office, also joined with both the defense and prosecution in opposing Clem.

"Miss Clem has no standing here," Canzoneri told Richmond. "It's an illogical leap to say that Marsy's Law gives a victim's family member the ability to interfere with a defendant's rights. This would send a message that anytime any victim is unhappy with how a local DA is handling a case, they have the right to intervene and essentially prosecute it themselves. It would mean district attorneys have no authority at all."

The most passionate arguments against Clem's plan came from Cotta, despite the fact that he'd file a motion that sought to do essentially the same thing that she hoped to do. Cotta portrayed what Clem and Harris-Ritter were attempting to accomplish as an affront to the United States Constitution.

"The law clearly states that a victim's family member has remedies, not rights - certainly not rights above a defendant's right to have a fair trial," Cotta declared. "Furthermore, Miss Clem is not the victim of anything until a jury says she's a victim. For her to take the position that she's a victim this early in the proceedings - to such an extent that she can interfere with the court - would be the same thing as automatically convicting my client before he's made his case in front of a lawful jury of his peers. It essentially denies my client the presumption of innocence. It would turn 400 years of jural prudence on its head. Why even bother having a trial?"

Richmond told the courtroom that he'd read Marsy's Law carefully and did not find that it allowed Clem to participate in the motion that was before him. He added, "The United States Supreme Court has said that citizens interfering in criminal cases would have ominous consequences."

When Harris-Ritter protested to Richmond that she was not trying to interfere or intervene in the proceedings, the judge said to her, "I don't see how anyone can intelligently come to the conclusion that you're trying to do anything other than intervene."

On the issue of whether Riebe and his staff would be recused by the defense's motion, Richmond found insufficient cause. "There has to be a true conflict," Richmond explained. "The court finds that the civil case and the criminal case are separate actions. To say that the district attorney would be over-zealous or under-zealous without proof is just wild speculation."

Cotta told the Ledger Dispatch that he respected Richmond's decision to allow the district attorney to stay on, even if he didn't agree with it. On the issue of Clem's interpretation of Marsy's Law, he felt Richmond had made a crucially important ruling. "What Miss Clem and Harris-Ritter wanted to do denies a defendant the presumption of innocence," he said Tuesday. "It would not only violate Mr. Zimmerman's rights under the U.S. Constitution, but it would also violate the rights of the jury in this case. In that sense, it would violate the rights of the people to exert their authority."

When asked about the number of attorneys involved with Friday's hearing, Cotta shrugged and remarked, "It's an arena; but there's something more important than any particular attorney or individual, and that's protecting the law."