Prosecutor O’Neill Named to Judgeship : Judiciary: The veteran chief deputy district attorney will fill a vacancy on the Municipal Court bench.

Gov. Pete Wilson on Thursday named a longtime Ventura County prosecutor to a Municipal Court judgeship at the urging of the county district attorney and a group of influential area Republicans.

Wilson announced that Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Vincent J. O’Neill Jr. will fill the position vacated by Charles W. Campbell Jr., who was elevated by Wilson to the Superior Court in January.

“Vincent O’Neill is an outstanding candidate with over 13 years of experience as an attorney with the Ventura County district attorney’s office,” Wilson said. “I have every confidence he will make a fine judge.”

The move to place O’Neill, 40, on the bench was applauded by members of the county’s legal and political communities who have been trying for about five years to secure a judicial appointment for the veteran prosecutor.

“It’s long overdue,” said Paul Leavens, a member of a small group of Ventura County Republicans that plays a pivotal role in advising the governor on the selection of new judges in the county.

“The majority of this community seems to prefer tough judges. He will be a good one.”

O’Neill said he was “extremely pleased” to receive the offer. He is expected to assume the $90,680 position by October, becoming one of 12 Municipal Court judges in Ventura County.

“I’m looking forward to a real turning point in my career,” O’Neill said. “I’ve missed being in court. I enjoy the intellectual, legal side of the law. There is a good amount of that on the bench.”

As chief deputy to Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury, O’Neill is responsible for managing a staff of 75 attorneys.

Although other members of Bradbury’s staff said they were pleased simply because O’Neill deserved the judgeship, some expressed relief because the appointment will help the office cope with budgetary cutbacks.

The decision to move O’Neill, who is paid $87,516 as chief deputy, means the district attorney’s office might not be forced to cut staff as deeply as anticipated to make up for a 5% budget reduction.

Originally, officials were fearful they would have to lay off eight prosecutors in the wake of the state budget crunch.

“By losing a person at the high end of the salary scale, some people at the low end will be kept,” said one attorney, who asked not to be identified.

“It is very helpful,” Bradbury said. But at the same time, he said, he was sorry to be losing “such a fine trial lawyer and a terrific administrator.”

“He has been an absolutely outstanding district attorney,” said Bradbury, who contacted Wilson several months ago to recommend O’Neill for the judgeship. “It’s tough to lose him.’

O’Neill, who describes himself as a moderate Republican, is a graduate of the UCLA School of Law. He started with the district attorney’s office in 1979 as a prosecutor in the misdemeanor unit.

He worked his way up through the ranks and was named supervisor of the sexual assault unit in 1983. A year later, he was named chief deputy district attorney, the third-highest-ranking position in the office.

Recently, O’Neill was given a sabbatical to prosecute a case of his choice. He took on the first case in the state in which someone was charged with assault for knowingly spreading the AIDS virus. In July, O’Neill won a guilty verdict against David Scott Crother of Santa Barbara who had been accused of giving the deadly virus to a Ventura County woman and the daughter they conceived.

During most of his tenure with the district attorney’s office, however, O’Neill was in charge of training the new attorneys, managing the staff and supervising the way cases were prosecuted.

“We saw the office through some very good financial times, and now some bad ones,” he said. “I would train the new attorneys and supervise the prosecution of the majority of the cases in the office, everything from misdemeanors to murders.”

But O’Neill said he always wanted to becoming a judge. The scholarly part of the job intrigued him.

Last spring, he considered running for an open Superior Court judgeship but decided to wait and see if he could secure the Municipal Court appointment instead.

“I felt I had a reasonable chance for the position I’ve now been selected for,” he said. “I rolled the dice and it panned out.”

O’Neill said he expects to be a “tough judge when it is deserved in criminal cases.”

But he said: “I will be one that gives both sides an opportunity to be heard.”

Colleagues of O’Neill described him as intellectual, dedicated and even-tempered.

“He keeps up with the law and he has a fine judicial temperament,” said Richard Holmes, a deputy district attorney. “He’s not the kind of guy to fly off the handle.”

Public Defender Kenneth I. Clayman added: “In all my dealings with Vince, he has always been honest. He’s a person of his word. Those qualities will serve him well. I expect he will be a good judge.”

Biography Age: 40

Experience: O’Neill has held the position of Ventura County chief deputy district attorney since 1984. He began his legal career in 1977 as a state deputy attorney general in the criminal division of the Los Angeles office and joined the Ventura County district attorney’s office two years later.

Education: After graduating from St. Bonaventure High School in 1970, O’Neill attended Loyola University in Los Angeles, where he received a bachelor of arts degree in English in 1974. In 1977, he graduated from the UCLA School of Law.

Family: He is married to Deborah Denise Frahm and has one 14-year-old daughter and two sons, ages 12 and 10.

Political affiliation: O’Neill is a registered Republican.