The State : Councilman Is Cleared

Berkeley City Councilman Fred Weekes was acquitted of illegally exporting microcomputers that allegedly were to be sold in China. A U.S. District Court jury in San Francisco acquitted Weekes, 62, of 15 charges of export violations, filing false documents and conspiracy, involving his former job as vice president of Dual Systems Corp. The company’s former president, Bernardus Smit, 60, of Piedmont, was convicted on 10 of 17 charges against him. Weekes’ lawyer, Mark Topel, said the councilman, an electrical engineer, was in charge of computer production and was not responsible for sales and marketing, on which the charges were based. “If there was any shenanigans going on overseas, Mr. Weekes would have been the last person to know about it,” Topel said. Weekes, a member of the council’s relatively conservative minority faction, was elected in November, 1986. A felony conviction would have required his removal from office.