Man Snubs Court for 10th Time on Ticket : Newhall: The Eureka resident fails to pay $138 fine by the deadline. His bail was once $99,999.

Despite being given an opportunity to settle a 5-year-old traffic citation at a bargain price, Michael Joseph Pommerening has for the 10th time thumbed his nose at Newhall court officials.

But court officials say it’s just a matter of time before the scofflaw is nabbed by the long arm of justice.

Pommerening, 34, of Eureka had so angered Newhall Municipal Judge Alan S. Rosenfield for failing nine times to appear in court on a 1987 traffic citation that in March the judge set bail at $99,999--the maximum allowed for traffic violations.

But after Pommerening wrote to Rosenfield in February appealing for leniency, the judge decided to show Pommerening that justice can be merciful. The judge gave the Humboldt County resident until April 30 to settle the entire matter by simply paying $138.60--a 30% discount from his original fine of $198.

Court officials said Wednesday, however, that Pommerening still has not come up with the money and they believe he is ignoring the latest--and last--court deadline.

Newhall Court Administrator Earl Bradley said, “The matter will be reviewed and in all likelihood a warrant will be reissued.”

Rosenfield is away from the Municipal Court bench until May 18 to hear a court-martial case. A warrant has not be issued nor has the $99,999 bail been reinstated, Bradley said.

It will be up to Rosenfield to decide how to respond to Pommerening’s latest rebuff of the court.

But even when the judge returns, it is not expected that Rosenfield will ask a Los Angeles County marshal to take time away from addressing riot-related matters in Los Angeles to go to Eureka in Humboldt County to bring Pommerening back, said Judge H. Keith Byram, who is handling some of Rosenfield’s cases while he is gone.

“I think it would be nearly impossible to send a marshal up there,” the judge said.

But Byram said Pommerening is not going to skate away from the violation. “We’ll get around to him when the time is appropriate,” he said.

Bradley agreed. “It’s not a major thing,” he said. “It’s not like we have a murder suspect. . . . But the likelihood that the judge will say let’s just dismiss it is slim.”

This is not the first time Pommerening has managed to slip through the cracks of the justice system.

Since Rosenfield first issued an arrest warrant for Pommerening in November, 1991, authorities in Humboldt County have stopped Pommerening at least four times for speeding and driving without insurance. But law enforcement officials there have failed to hold him because of a Superior Court order prohibiting jail overcrowding.

Pommerening could not be reached for comment.