Silberman’s Request for ‘Electronic Leash’ Denied

Rejecting Richard T. Silberman’s request to be put on a so-called “electronic leash,” a federal judge said Wednesday that the San Diego financier had to remain in jail without bail to await sentencing for a conviction linked to an alleged money-laundering scheme.

U.S. District Judge J. Lawrence Irving said Silberman, a one-time governor’s aide, will have to remain at the federal Metropolitan Correctional Center in downtown San Diego to await sentencing Sept. 25.

In a terse, two-page order, Irving, who presided over Silberman’s recently concluded trial, did not directly explain why electronic monitoring was not a suitable alternative. Defense attorneys had asked Irving to place Silberman under house arrest and to fit his ankle with an electronic transmitter that would notify authorities if he left his La Jolla residence.

Reiterating only his reason for ordering Silberman to jail immediately after conviction on one of several counts, Irving said the prominent businessman had not proven that he is not a flight risk. The judge did not elaborate.

Silberman, 61, a one-time top aide to former Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr., was convicted June 28 of violating a federal currency law in what prosecutors contend was a scheme to launder $300,000 that an undercover FBI agent allegedly portrayed as the proceeds of Colombian drug trafficking.

Irving declared a mistrial on June 29 on five other charges after the jury reported it was deadlocked, heavily in favor of conviction, on those counts.

Prosecutors immediately announced that they would try Silberman, who is married to San Diego County Supervisor Susan Golding, a second time on the unresolved counts. The second trial is scheduled to begin Sept. 25, the same day Silberman is scheduled to be sentenced.

Although Silberman could draw as much as 10 years in prison, new federal sentencing guidelines indicate that a term of one to five years is likely.

Immediately after Silberman’s conviction June 28 on the sole count, Irving sent him to jail, saying that was what the law required unless Silberman could clearly prove that he would not flee.

Because Silberman disappeared from San Diego last February, Irving said he had no choice but to send him to jail.

Two days after he disappeared, Silberman was found in a Las Vegas hotel, unconscious, where--prompted by an adverse pretrial ruling from Irving--he purportedly had tried to kill himself with an overdose of sleeping pills.

Silberman’s defense attorneys, who had asked Irving to consider the so-called “electronic leash” as an alternative to jail pending sentencing, could not be reached Wednesday for comment.

The “leash” is really a transmitter about the size of a cigarette pack that is banded to the ankle and sends a continuous signal from a radius of 150 feet to a receiver, which is attached to a telephone in the house. The phone is linked to computers in Ohio, which monitor the signal for disruptions.

Defense lawyers had said at a special June 29 hearing that Silberman would even be willing to pay for the system himself, saving taxpayers the $40 a day it would cost to keep him in jail.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Charles F. Gorder Jr., the lead prosecutor in the case, declined to comment on Irving’s order.

At the June 29 hearing, Gorder argued that proximity to the international border could enable Silberman to be in Mexico before authorities could respond to his absence.