3 Defendants ‘Knew’ of Pentagon Bribery : Prosecutor Closes His Case; Defense Cites Plea Bargain

Three California businessmen charged in the Pentagon corruption scandal “knew more than they wanted to admit they knew” about a scheme to bribe a Navy engineer, a prosecutor told a jury today.

The defendants, all former executive vice presidents of Teledyne Electronics of Newbury Park, Calif., are accused of conspiracy, bribery and wire fraud in the first trial stemming from the government’s nearly 3-year-old investigation of kickbacks and bribery in the Pentagon’s purchasing system.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Jack Hanly said in his closing argument that the defendants--Eugene Sullivan, George Kaub and Dale Schnittjer--were aware that a private consultant they had hired was paying bribes to obtain information about a lucrative radar contract.

$24-Million Contract

But defense attorney Mark Tuohey, representing Kaub, tried to pick apart the government’s case by pointing out that the main witnesses had pleaded guilty in exchange for lesser sentences and were cooperating with the government.

U.S. District Judge Richard Williams was to explain the charges to the jury before the group of four women and eight men begin their deliberations in the trial that began a week ago.

Tuohey said Kaub had no idea that William Parkin, the private consultant hired by Teledyne Electronics, had paid money to Stuart Berlin, a Navy engineer, for details about a $24-million contract that Teledyne won to make hand-held radar sets. Parkin and Berlin are among those who pleaded guilty in exchange for helping the government.

‘Motive . . . to Save Skin’

The government’s witnesses had “every motive in the world to save their skin,” Tuohey argued. “Each came into the courtroom under immunity promising to cooperate with the prosecution with a hammer over their heads.”

But Tuohey said his client was in the dark, a victim of a conspiracy between Parkin, Berlin and two other men. Their only motive was “to get everything you can and don’t tell anybody about it,” he said.

But prosecutor Hanly said of the defendants, “They knew more than they wanted to admit they knew.”

During the trial, the jury heard tape-recorded conversations between Parkin and the defendants obtained from wiretaps.