Tuffree Pleads Not Guilty in Officer Death : Simi Valley: The former teacher ignores his attorneys’ advice and asks the judge to start his death-penalty trial as soon as possible.

Over the protest of his attorneys, Daniel Allan Tuffree on Thursday pleaded not guilty to killing a Simi Valley police officer and asked a judge to start his death-penalty trial as soon as possible.

Lawyers for the former social studies teacher had planned to ask Judge Allan L. Steele for more time to prepare a defense and to delay the start of the trial.

But at Tuffree’s insistence, Steele set a Dec. 18 trial date.

“Mr. Tuffree is exercising poor judgment. He is still reeling from the shock,” defense attorney Richard Holly said. “He can’t believe that he’s defending himself in his own home and now the [district attorney] wants to kill him. He is in absolute shock. It’s like a nightmare for him. He can’t believe this is happening.”

Dist. Atty. Michael D. Bradbury announced Tuesday that he will seek the death penalty for the killing of 28-year-old Officer Michael F. Clark on Aug. 4.

Holly said he will counsel Tuffree to change his mind and seek a delay in the trial until the new year.

“I think his decision is not rational,” said Holly, a public defender. “But I think his decision is based in part on the announcement that the D.A. will seek the death penalty.”

Additionally, Holly said he has not decided if he will ask for a change of venue because of pretrial publicity.

The clean-shaven Tuffree appeared in court Thursday with his right index finger still bandaged from wounds he received in a shootout with police at his Simi Valley home that left Clark dead.

Prosecutors have declined to discuss details of the case, but before the Ventura County grand jury last month they contended that Tuffree nursed a long-simmering grudge against the Simi Valley police and that he intended to kill Clark when he armed himself with his Glock .40-caliber semiautomatic weapon.

Tuffree, a teacher who last taught in Van Nuys, admits shooting Clark in the back but contends he acted in self-defense after the officer opened fire first.

Clark and two officers were asked to check on Tuffree on Aug. 4 after the teacher reportedly became irate that a pharmacy would not fill his Valium prescription.

An enraged Tuffree called his insurance carrier to complain.

An official there called a private mental health worker and asked her to contact Tuffree, who was said to have been drinking beer and taking Valium for two days.

When the mental health worker could not reach Tuffree by telephone, she called police.

Kathleen Harthorn, a psychiatric technician with the Behavioral Health Center in Simi Valley, told the grand jury that she became concerned that Tuffree was unconscious when he did not answer her telephone calls.

She told the grand jury that she called Ventura County Mental Health Services first, but was told a mobile crisis team was unavailable to check on Tuffree because it had left five minutes before Harthorn’s inquiry on another, unrelated call.

Holly said as part of his defense, he will allege that the Ventura County mental health system failed Tuffree and that the overreaction of the three police officers started the shootout.