Safer v. Superior Court

*233Opinion

TOBRINER, J.

In this case we hold that a court acts in excess of its jurisdiction when it permits a district attorney to disregard the statutory confines of his authority by prosecuting under the Code of Civil Procedure a contempt stemming from a civil litigation in. which the district attorney could rest his participation neither upon standing as a party nor upon statutory authorization. To forbid the continuation of the unlawful proceedings thus instituted, we issue our writ of prohibition.

In the spring of 1974 the United Farm Workers of America (hereinafter Farm Workers) set up…