Wilkes trial to begin Wednesday

Wilkes trial to begin Wednesday
By Susan Crabtree
September 29, 2007


The trial of businessman Brent Wilkes and a co-conspirator accused of bribing former Rep. Randy Duke Cunningham (R-Calif.) is slated to begin Wednesday, one day later than originally planned.

Judge Larry Alan Burns of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California in San Diego re-set the trial late Friday after Wilkes’s defense team filed several motions to exclude evidence and requested that the trial be delayed.

Burns denied Wilkes’s and co-conspirator John Michael’s efforts to delay the trial and said he would consider Wilkes’s motions to exclude evidence Tuesday.

Celebrity attorney Mark Geragos has been waging an aggressive defense of Wilkes, who is accused of giving Cunningham hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, gifts and favors, such as luxurious trips, antiques, boats and the services of prostitutes in exchange for help securing tens of millions of dollars in defense contracts. Cunningham is serving an eight-year sentence for accepting the bribes from Wilkes and others.

Geragos filed several motions to deny evidence Friday. One seeks to exclude all testimony and evidence regarding the alleged patronage of prostitutes by Wilkes and Cunningham on the grounds that it would unfairly prejudice the jury and would deny Wilkes the right to a fair trial under the fifth and sixth amendments to the Constitution.

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