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Another Lawyer Pleads Guilty in Bribery Case
By JONATHAN D. GLATER
Published: March 22, 2008
David Zachary Scruggs, the son of the well-known and recently disgraced trial lawyer Richard F. Scruggs, reached a plea agreement on Friday with federal prosecutors who had charged him with a role in a conspiracy to bribe a state court judge.
Cheryl Gerber for The New York Times
David Zachary Scruggs, left, and his father, Richard F. Scruggs, reached separate plea arrangements with federal prosecutors.
Zachary Scruggs, as he is known, has agreed to plead guilty to knowing of and concealing a felony, the result of improper communications between a lawyer and the judge. Prosecutors are recommending that he receive a sentence of probation, according to court documents.
Mr. Scruggs’s father pleaded guilty to a role in the conspiracy last week and faces up to five years in prison. The guilty pleas come after an investigation into accusations of bribery and corruption in a lawsuit over how to divide millions of dollars in legal fees in the wake of lawsuits that sought to compel insurance companies to pay more in compensation to victims of Hurricane Katrina.
According to prosecutors, Mr. Scruggs’s father, along with other defendants in the case, tried to bribe the state court judge hearing the fee dispute to rule in their favor. But the judge, Henry L. Lackey, reported the attempted bribe to prosecutors. Then an associate of Mr. Scruggs’s agreed to wear a recording device while discussing the bribe with members of the conspiracy, prosecutors stated in court documents.
The case against both Richard Scruggs, who is known as Dickie, and his son has fascinated lawyers across the country. The elder Mr. Scruggs built a fortune suing makers of asbestos on behalf of workers who said they were harmed by their exposure to the material, which can cause fatal lung disease. He went on to take on Big Tobacco, in a battle portrayed in the movie “The Insider,” and helped win hundreds of billions of dollars from the industry.
Zachary Scruggs, also a lawyer, worked at his father’s firm. When the elder Mr. Scruggs pleaded guilty last week, several lawyers in Mississippi speculated that he was taking the step to protect his son.
As a result, lawyers said Friday’s announcement of a plea deal that headed off a trial of Zachary Scruggs did not come as a surprise.
“All along, Dickie Scruggs was the one the U.S. government wanted to convict,” said Carl W. Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond who has followed the case. “He is such a high-profile person and he’s been involved in so many important and controversial pieces of litigation.”
Mr. Tobias added that the plea by Zachary Scruggs is “kind of a footnote, an afterthought.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/22/business/22legal.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
By JONATHAN D. GLATER
Published: March 22, 2008
David Zachary Scruggs, the son of the well-known and recently disgraced trial lawyer Richard F. Scruggs, reached a plea agreement on Friday with federal prosecutors who had charged him with a role in a conspiracy to bribe a state court judge.
Cheryl Gerber for The New York Times
David Zachary Scruggs, left, and his father, Richard F. Scruggs, reached separate plea arrangements with federal prosecutors.
Zachary Scruggs, as he is known, has agreed to plead guilty to knowing of and concealing a felony, the result of improper communications between a lawyer and the judge. Prosecutors are recommending that he receive a sentence of probation, according to court documents.
Mr. Scruggs’s father pleaded guilty to a role in the conspiracy last week and faces up to five years in prison. The guilty pleas come after an investigation into accusations of bribery and corruption in a lawsuit over how to divide millions of dollars in legal fees in the wake of lawsuits that sought to compel insurance companies to pay more in compensation to victims of Hurricane Katrina.
According to prosecutors, Mr. Scruggs’s father, along with other defendants in the case, tried to bribe the state court judge hearing the fee dispute to rule in their favor. But the judge, Henry L. Lackey, reported the attempted bribe to prosecutors. Then an associate of Mr. Scruggs’s agreed to wear a recording device while discussing the bribe with members of the conspiracy, prosecutors stated in court documents.
The case against both Richard Scruggs, who is known as Dickie, and his son has fascinated lawyers across the country. The elder Mr. Scruggs built a fortune suing makers of asbestos on behalf of workers who said they were harmed by their exposure to the material, which can cause fatal lung disease. He went on to take on Big Tobacco, in a battle portrayed in the movie “The Insider,” and helped win hundreds of billions of dollars from the industry.
Zachary Scruggs, also a lawyer, worked at his father’s firm. When the elder Mr. Scruggs pleaded guilty last week, several lawyers in Mississippi speculated that he was taking the step to protect his son.
As a result, lawyers said Friday’s announcement of a plea deal that headed off a trial of Zachary Scruggs did not come as a surprise.
“All along, Dickie Scruggs was the one the U.S. government wanted to convict,” said Carl W. Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond who has followed the case. “He is such a high-profile person and he’s been involved in so many important and controversial pieces of litigation.”
Mr. Tobias added that the plea by Zachary Scruggs is “kind of a footnote, an afterthought.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/22/business/22legal.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin
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