Silberman Figure Tied to Mob Is Denied Bail

Chris Petti, a reputed organized-crime figure accused of joining with San Diego businessman Richard T. Silberman to launder $300,000 the two men allegedly were told came from Colombian cocaine traffickers, was ordered held without bail Thursday by a federal magistrate who called him a threat to society.

After a 45-minute hearing, U. S. Magistrate Roger Curtis McKee said prosecutors had convinced him that Petti, 62, “is a danger to at least some portion of the community” and should remain in custody at the Metropolitan Correctional Center pending a preliminary hearing next Friday.

Petti’s attorney, Oscar Goodman of Las Vegas, said he will appeal McKee’s decision to a U. S. district judge Monday.

Meanwhile, Jack Norman Myers of Los Angeles, the fourth person charged in a money-laundering scheme allegedly directed by Silberman, surrendered and was arraigned before McKee on Thursday. Myers, 43, a man with a compact build, ruddy complexion and thick, graying hair, was allowed to remain free on a $100,000 personal surety bond to be secured by his parents’ home.

Prosecutors had asked that Myers’ bail be set at $200,000. But McKee reduced the amount after Myers’ attorney noted that his client has strong ties to Los Angeles--including a 14-year-old son--and continuing obligations at his Westwood business-services firm, First Transnational Co.

A federal affidavit says Myers and Darryl Nakatsuka acted as couriers for Silberman in two transactions involving a total of $300,000--money an undercover agent told them originated with Colombian drug traffickers. Nakatsuka, 42, of Pasadena, was arraigned Tuesday and is free on $200,000 bail.

Sources said Myers, the former son-in-law of entertainment magnate Lew Wasserman, has known Silberman since the two raised funds for campaigns of former Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr. His attorney, Barry Tarlow of Los Angeles, confirmed that relationship Thursday and said Myers and Silberman have “a long business history together” as well.

In remarks to reporters outside the courthouse, Tarlow also insisted that the 76-page affidavit “contains not a single word suggesting my client committed a crime. They have wiretaps. They have videotapes. If my client had done something wrong, wouldn’t it be on there?”

He said Myers “had no idea” that the money was from an illegal source. Asked where his client believed the money originated, Tarlow said, “That, you’ll hear at trial.”

According to Tarlow, Myers is acquainted with Nakatsuka and with Terry Ziegler, a stock analyst who FBI agents say arranged the purchase of U. S. Treasury bonds for Silberman in one alleged laundering transaction. Tarlow also said Myers “has been involved” with Yuba Natural Resources, a mining company run by Silberman, but would not elaborate.

Petti and Silberman, 59, were arrested a week ago and are charged with conspiring to launder money and failure to report a currency transaction to the government. FBI agents encountered Silberman, who is married to San Diego County Supervisor Susan Golding and is a former close adviser to Brown, during a 2 1/2-year investigation into Petti, who allegedly is an associate of the Cosa Nostra crime family in Chicago.

Petti has been characterized by the FBI as a middleman who linked Silberman with an undercover agent posing as a representative of Colombian drug traffickers. In their effort to have him held without bail Thursday, prosecutors noted that Petti was on probation for a federal bookmaking conviction at the time of his arrest and was fined $1,000 in connection with a 1979 assault with a baseball bat.

Assistant U. S. Atty. Carol Lam also said Petti was plotting the armed robbery of a Las Vegas sports bookmaker known only as “Marty the Jew” when he was arrested at a San Diego hotel Friday. Under questioning by Lam, FBI Special Agent Charles B. Walker testified that Johnny Spilotro--brother of the late Anthony (Tony the Ant) Spilotro--believed Marty the Jew had as much as $500,000 in cash and casino chips at his bookmaking office. A map of the office and plans for the robbery--which was to be conducted by alleged strongman Carmen DiNunzio--were being assembled in recent weeks, Walker testified.

Petti was also overheard discussing the planned extortion of four men--Joseph Pignatello, Ross Lantieri, Sarge Ferris (who died of cancer recently) and Robert Veltry--during conversations recorded secretly by the FBI, Walker testified. The agent said threats ranging from death to broken bones were made in the wiretapped conversations.

The federal affidavit alleges that Petti was engaged in extortion to collect debts owed Tony the Ant Spilotro. Spilotro’s nephew, John Spilotro Jr., attended Thursday’s court hearing, according to a federal source.

In contrast to the portrait drawn by prosecutors, lawyer Goodman called Petti “a very quiet fellow” and said his greatest offense “might be drinking a few too many beers” at a Chargers football game.

Arguing for his client’s release on bail, Goodman asked why Petti had not been arrested long ago if the FBI--in monitoring his telephone calls--determined he was a threat to the community.

“If Mr. Petti is that big a danger to society, then shame on the government for not arresting him sooner,” Goodman said.

A flamboyant attorney who has represented other reputed organized-crime figures and defended former San Diego Mayor Roger Hedgecock on perjury and conspiracy charges in 1985, Goodman also challenged the government’s assertion that they have a “very strong case” against Petti and Silberman.

“I’m a betting man,” he said, “and I’m waiting for someone to make me a proposition.”

In another development Thursday, it was disclosed that the wife and sister-in-law of Ziegler, the Westlake Village securities man who allegedly provided untraceable U. S. Treasury bonds to Silberman in one laundering transaction, have been fired by the securities firm where they worked.

H. Thomas Fehn, a Los Angeles attorney representing Adams Securities, said Erin Ziegler and her sister, whom he identified only as Colleen, were “terminated” in the last day or two for what he said was inadequate performance of their duties. He added that the firm had also decided to withdraw assistance it had been providing Terry Ziegler in his attempt to obtain a brokers license from the National Assn. of Securities Dealers.

Fehn insisted that the firings were not related to the criminal case. But a ranking official at Adams Securities’ Las Vegas headquarters, who asked that his name not be used, gave The Times a different account of the firings.

“I talked to Ziegler when this first hit,” the official said, “and I said, ‘Tell me the truth, are you innocent?’ He said, ‘I have nothing to do with it.’ I wished him luck, but told him we’d have to let his wife and sister-in-law go, that we couldn’t afford to be involved with this.”

Fehn said that Erin Ziegler had been serving as manager of Adams Securities’ Santa Barbara office and the sister-in-law worked in the firm’s Westlake Village office.

He noted, however, that the activities relating to the alleged payment of $200,000 to Terry Ziegler, then working as a part-time analyst at the Westlake Village office, and his subsequent providing of the untraceable bonds had occurred a few weeks ago, before Adams Securities took over the premises from Hamilton-Williams & Co., a firm that was going out of business.

Adams Securities retained most of the Hamilton-Williams staff after the takeover, Fehn indicated. The lawyer said, however, that he had become “nervous” about what may have been been occurring at the Westlake Village office under the old firm when, one day after he went there on an inspection trip after Adams Securities’ arrival, FBI agents showed up with a search warrant and wanted to go through the Hamilton-Williams records that were still there.

“We want to get as far away from this as we can,” Fehn said. “We just don’t want the problem, which our firm had nothing to do with in the first place.”

Neither Ziegler nor his relations could be reached for comment.

Times staff writer Kenneth Reich in Los Angeles contributed to this story.