D.A. Won’t File Charges in Rally Spitting Case

COSTA MESA —  The Orange County district attorney’s office on Monday declined to file charges against a man who police say spit in a woman’s eye during a political gathering and told her that he had the AIDS virus.

The case was sent back to police for further investigation, Deputy Dist. Atty. Delbert L. Wright said.

Wright said it is necessary to get a medical test to prove that 44-year-old David Mazer has AIDS.

Wright could not recall another case in Orange County where someone was suspected of attempted murder for allegedly spitting on someone else.

“We’re not in a hotbed of that type of activity,” Wright said.

On Thursday night, at a political rally for Gov. Bill Clinton at the Pacific Amphitheatre, Mazer allegedly told 73-year-old Elizabeth Mimm of Mission Viejo that he blamed President Bush for his having AIDS and then spit on the woman, police said. He was arrested and booked into County Jail on suspicion of attempted murder.

Attorney Marshall M. Schulman, who represents Mazer, said his client should not have been arrested as an attempted murder suspect. He also said there has never been a successful prosecution of an AIDS-related attempted murder in Orange County.

“There was no attempted murder here by any stretch of the imagination,” Schulman said and added that his client had neither attempted nor intended to commit murder.

Mazer declined to comment and referred all questions to his attorney.

Last weekend, Mazer was released on $250,000 bail, Costa Mesa Police Capt. Rick Johnson said.

“If there is more evidence needed, then we have to go back and investigate it more,” Johnson said.