A federal judge in San Diego removed Mark Geragos from a sensational bribery case yesterday because the (in)famous Orange County-based defense lawyer refused to agree to a federal background check before receiving classified national-security-related data.
Geragos—who worked for convicted wife-and-baby-killer Scott Peterson, Michael Jackson and Winona Ryder—was attempting to represent defense contractor Brent Wilkes in a bribery case involving tearful, ex-Congressman Randy “Duke” Cunningham, according to the San Diego Union Tribune.
Along with Kyle “Dusty” Foggo, a childhood friend of Wilkes and formerly the third-highest official in the CIA, the two are charged with numerous counts of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering relating to the bribery scandal that brought down Cunningham.
The San Diego paper reported that Geragos may ask the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse the judges' order.
For decades, Cunningham was a highly praised conservative—especially among Orange County Republicans—before he admitted in 2005 he was a crooked politician who took millions of dollars in bribes on military matters.
Federal investigators say Cunningham secretly accepted more than $2.5 million from defense contractors who wanted favors from his lofty, arrogant position as a know-it-all Bible-thumping ex-soldier.
CNN-featured investigative reporter R. Scott Moxley has won Journalist of the Year honors at the Los Angeles Press Club; been named Distinguished Journalist of the Year by the LA Society of Professional Journalists; obtained one of the last exclusive prison interviews with Charles Manson disciple Susan Atkins; won inclusion in Jeffrey Toobin’s The Best American Crime Reporting for his coverage of a white supremacist’s senseless murder of a beloved Vietnamese refugee; launched multi-year probes that resulted in the FBI arrests and convictions of the top three ranking members of the Orange County Sheriff’s Department; and gained praise from New York Times Magazine writers for his “herculean job” exposing entrenched Southern California law enforcement corruption.