Alleged misconduct by Orange County Superior Court Judge Michael Murray may go deeper than the one case cited in charges brought by the state Commission on Judicial Performance, according to a legal motion filed last week.

The alleged misconduct occurred while Murray was a deputy district attorney, before his 2016 election to the bench.

Murray faces an April 25 hearing on a state charge that he withheld evidence showing a CHP report was altered in a murder case involving the death of an off-duty law enforcement officer. The Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy was killed when his car swerved into a cement truck to avoid a stolen stove that had fallen from a pickup truck on the 91 Freeway in Anaheim.

The report concluded that the deputy’s speed was at fault for the accident, but it was later altered to put the blame on the stove thief, Cole Wilkins. Wilkins was convicted of murder, but released from prison after 13 years when an appellate court reduced the charge to manslaughter.

Murray, in his answer to the state commission, conceded the altered report should have been shared with defense attorneys, but said he didn’t know during the trial that the report had been changed.

In legal papers filed March 17, Assistant Public Defender Scott Sanders alleged that Murray’s “history of misconduct” as a prosecutor stretched to three other cases.

In the case of David Valladares, who pleaded guilty to second-degree murder after a 1998 jewelry store heist, Sanders wrote that Murray withheld fingerprint evidence favorable to the defense for nearly two years.

Under changes in the law, Valladares’ conviction is being reconsidered before Judge Kimberly Menninger. Sanders filed last week’s motion requesting that Menninger remove herself from the case because she endorsed Murray’s campaign for judge in 2016.

Sanders also noted other examples of alleged misconduct by Murray.

In April 2007, the 4th District Court of Appeal upheld the conviction of Thai Ba Tran, who gunned down Jeremy Foster and Thang Nguyen in December 1996 at a Westminster Park. But the appellate court lambasted Murray in its opinion, citing his “numerous acts of misconduct.”

“Our conclusion Tran was not prejudiced by Michael Murray’s numerous acts of misconduct does not mean we approve or condone his tactics and behavior,” the appellate justices wrote. “The district attorney should take little solace in the fact we have affirmed Tran’s convictions. … (Murray’s) duty is not to obtain convictions but to present to the court the evidence material to the charge upon which the defendant stands trial.”

In another example, Murray and an investigator from the District Attorney’s Office in March 2009 interviewed veteran jailhouse informant Oscar Moriel. The recording of that interview should have been shared with three murder defendants, but was not. All three were sentenced to death, Sanders wrote. Moriel went on to commit suicide in 2021.

Murray admitted in court hearings that he had violated state disclosure laws, but not federal constitutional laws, with the Moriel recording.

Judges Menninger and Murray were restrained from commenting under state law, said courthouse spokesman Kostas Kalaitzidis.

The current prosecutor in the Valladares case is Senior Deputy District Attorney Eric Scarbrough, who is running for judge in the June 7 primary. Sanders wrote he will also seek to have Scarbrough removed from the case because of his actions in the Wilkins affair.

Scarbrough wrote in legal papers in 2015 that no disclosure violation occurred in the Wilkins case — at the same time that Murray now says he realized a violation had indeed occurred. Scarbrough also allegedly concealed multiple interviews with law enforcement witnesses that were favorable to the Wilkins defense, the motion said.

Scarbrough did not return a telephone message seeking comment.

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