A man showed up at a Thousand Oaks shopping center hoping to meet the 13-year-old girl he spent months chatting with online.

There was no girl. There was a Thousand Oaks detective accompanied by Senior Deputy District Attorney Ryan Wright.

When Wright pursues criminal cases, his expertise in the intricacies of technical and complicated laws, such as those governing sexual predators, is a boon for law enforcement. The prosecutor can offer guidance and input on unfolding cases, instead of waiting to review them once they are brought to the District Attorney's Office.

"I'd like Thousand Oaks to get the reputation that you don't come to Thousand Oaks to mess with kids," Wright said.

Wright is one of two community prosecutors in the county responsible for briefing and training officers on aspects of the law, reviewing and filing dozens of misdemeanor cases, determining whether a felony case should be filed and going over search warrants before they are sent to judges for final approval.

Instead of at desks in the District Attorney's Office, Wright and his counterpart, John West in Oxnard, work out of the police departments in the county's two largest cities.

Wright came to the Thousand Oaks Police Department's station after prosecuting sex crimes and major narcotics cases. His background and proximity help detectives as they put together cases.

"We've always worked hand in hand with the DA's office," Thousand Oaks Detective Eric Buschow said. "Having a prosecutor in the office makes that relationship that much stronger."

Grant money dried up

The program has earned praise from officials in both cities and District Attorney Greg Totten's office.

"It gets us close to serving the heart of the community," said Chief Deputy District Attorney Jeff Bennett. "It gets us involved right at the ground level."

The District Attorney's Office rolled out the Community Prosecutor program in 2002 with money from a federal grant designed to stem gang violence.

Deputy district attorneys were assigned to several police departments around the county, reviewing and filing misdemeanor complaints, taking part in community outreach and getting to know concerns specific to their assigned city. Then the grant money dried up.

Most cities dropped the program. Thousand Oaks officials decided to pay to keep the program going, calling it a worthwhile asset. They've done so since 2004, but not without complaint.

"The challenge with this is it's really a matter of policy," City Manager Scott Mitnick said in a June meeting, before the City Council decided to fund the program for two more years. "It's a county program. Should the county pay for it or should the city pay for it?"

The city will pay $214,666 to keep the senior deputy district attorney in-house through 2009.

Mitnick was tasked with negotiating a long-term funding strategy with the county.

County Executive Officer Johnny Johnston, however, said community prosecutors aren't a county program and it is incorrect to characterize it as such. County departments can seek grant funding for special programs and projects, but "when the money goes away, the program goes away," Johnston said.

The county's budget is tight." We are in a sustainable level, not an expanding level," Johnston said.

Insight into police cases

In Oxnard, the cost of the in-house prosecutor is covered by the District Attorney's Office. The city, however, does pay for three additional in-house prosecutors either fully or in part, Chief Deputy District Attorney Mike Frawley said. Two of those prosecutors are attached specifically to the police department's gang unit, while the other is dedicated to working on gang injunctions that are in place in the city.

"It's a huge, huge benefit," Oxnard Police Assistant Chief Mike Matlock said of having an in-house prosecutor. "Everybody from the patrol officer to the police executive appreciates and values having this resource."

The resource is West, who prosecuted homicides before he set up shop in the Oxnard Police Department this spring.

The shift from the District Attorney's Office to the Police Department — and from homicides to piles of misdemeanor cases — gave West insight into how police put cases together and the decisions they make.

West said the smaller cases are just as important as the homicides he once prosecuted because small problems can escalate and affect the quality of people's lives.

West helped come up with a solution to end the use of a busy public parking lot in downtown Oxnard as an unauthorized used-car lot. West and officers checked the cars that were for sale and found violations, such as missing rearview mirrors. Ticketing the offending vehicles helped dissuade owners from displaying their cars in the parking lot.

In the coming months he hopes to start attending community meetings and getting his name out to the public as he tackles misdemeanor cases, including driving without a license or vandalism, and advises officers.

Advised business people

Wright has worked out of the Thousand Oaks police station for 15 months. Newspaper clippings and a blown-up booking photo of Charles Manson, after his 1968 arrest in Ventura County, hang on the back of Wright's office door. Crayon drawings by his children hang on the wall. Every day is different.

"That's one of the reasons I love being a community prosecutor," Wright said. "I have no idea when I wake up in the morning what I'm going to be doing."

He has worked closely with narcotics officers to understand where the drugs are coming from and how they affect Thousand Oaks.

Sometimes he works with the business community, advising business people what to do when they catch someone engaged in identity theft and check fraud.

He has partnered with police and the management of the Conejo Creek Condominiums to address quality-of- life issues. Wright also works with the school district, discussing drug use among kids.

"It's such a tremendous benefit," Wright said. "I become aware of a case from its genesis."

Wright and detectives can share ideas about what will play better in court. Instead of detectives having to drive to Ventura to pitch a felony case to prosecutors and wait for them to determine whether they will take the case, they can go to Wright, Buschow said.

"It saves us countless man-hours," Buschow said. "We really respect him and respect his knowledge. We tap into that as much as possible."