Lawyer Puts Blame on Silberman as Trial of Reputed Mobster Opens

Reputed mobster Chris Petti was a “pawn” in a money-laundering scheme directed by financier Richard T. Silberman, an ex-con behind on his rent who was hustling for money and was cut out of all major decisions by Silberman, Petti’s defense attorney said Wednesday.

As Petti’s long-awaited trial began, defense lawyer Oscar Goodman rejected prosecutors’ contention that Petti was a central player in the laundering scheme and should be convicted just as Silberman was convicted.

Petti is “no virgin, no angel and talks with a lot of ‘dem’s’ and ‘dose,’ ” lawyer Oscar Goodman said. But talking tough is no crime, and in this case there “was a lot of talk and no action,” assuredly not enough action for conviction, Goodman said.

“Mr. Petti, rather than being the brains or the founder of the scheme, was a victim of it,” Goodman told U.S. District Judge J. Lawrence Irving. “Mr. Petti was taken advantage of and was used for his reputation.”

Petti, 63, of San Diego, was indicted in April, 1989, with Silberman and three other men on charges of laundering $300,000 that an undercover FBI agent had portrayed as the profits of Colombian cocaine trafficking.

Silberman, 61, a top aide to former Gov. Edmund G. Brown Jr., was sentenced to 46 months in federal prison and fined $50,000 for his role in the scheme.

Silberman was convicted June 28, after a two-month trial, of a technical currency violation. On Aug. 24, he pleaded guilty under a plea bargain to a felony conspiracy count, averting a second trial.

The three others have each pleaded guilty in the past few months to a sole felony count apiece.

Petti, believed to be connected to organized crime in Chicago and Las Vegas, has pleaded innocent to all seven counts against him and is free on $250,000 bail. If convicted on all counts, he could draw 75 years in federal prison.

Last week, Petti opted to forgo a jury trial and have Irving decide the case.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Charles F. Gorder Jr., the lead prosecutor in the case, began the trial Wednesday with an opening statement that recounted the same story told at Silberman’s trial.

According to Gorder, federal authorities stumbled onto Silberman after wiretapping Petti for months in a probe of mob interest in gaming operations on the Rincon Indian reservation.

Most of the government’s evidence in the case was collected through secret recordings, many gathered under a novel federal law--used for the first time--that allows agents to wiretap even public pay phones. Petti was the target of most of the wiretaps.

Just as the Rincon deal fell through, in September, 1988, agents heard Silberman call Petti--whom he had known from a barbershop where both had their hair cut--and ask if he knew anyone interested in laundering money, Gorder said.

That conversation evolved into two deals with undercover FBI agent Peter J. Ahearn, who was posing as Pete Carmassi, a front man for Colombian drug lords, Gorder said.

The first deal was a November, 1988, exchange of $100,000 for stock in a Silberman gold-mining subsidiary, Gorder said. The second was a February, 1989, swap of $200,000 for U.S. Treasury bonds, he said.

Petti introduced Silberman to Ahearn, Gorder said.

And, Gorder said, Silberman occasionally bragged on tapped phone calls that Petti’s purported mob “muscle” was available.

Gorder also said there never was any doubt that Petti understood the source of Ahearn’s money.

As testimony began, prosecutors played a secretly recorded tape of an April, 1988, conversation Petti had with Mike Caracci, believed by federal authorities to be a mob figure in Chicago, in which Petti said of Ahearn, “This guy’s with some Colombians.”

In his opening statment, defense lawyer Goodman did not dispute that Petti believed Ahearn’s cash purportedly came from drug trafficking. “Hearing Colombians, he didn’t think of Juan Valdez and coffee beans,” Goodman said.

But, because Petti himself had met Ahearn through Robert Benjamin, a longtime acquaintance, and because Petti was struggling in 1988 to make ends meet, he trusted Ahearn and “thought (Benjamin) had a live one--and with a live one there is always the possibility of making money,” Goodman said.

Petti expected a fee for putting Silberman and Ahearn together, Goodman said. Unknown to Petti, however, Benjamin was an informant cooperating with the FBI.

When Silberman called, Petti was flattered, Goodman said, since Silberman was “a fellow who appeared to be the most respected among the respected in San Diego.”

Petti also believed that Silberman was aware of his reputed mob ties, and figured Silberman “thought reputed mobsters had a lot of money, a lot of contacts,” Goodman said.

Petti, however, did not have either, since he had been released from federal prison in 1984 after serving nine months of a year-and-a-day sentence for a bookmaking conviction and was behind in his rent and car payments and was “vulnerable,” Goodman said.

Silberman put together both deals without telling Petti the details, Goodman said. For instance, Petti believed originally that the first deal would be for $200,000, not $100,000, and did not learn of the true value until the deal was done, Goodman said.

Then, when the value of the bonds in the second deal turned out to be as much as $50,000 less than Ahearn expected, Petti assured Ahearn he would “check out” Darryl Nakatsuka, 44, a West Los Angeles security guard who served as a courier in the case.

To “check out” Nakatsuka, Petti did not rely on any contact in Las Vegas or Chicago, Goodman said. Instead, he called Silberman, then told Ahearn that Nakatsuka’s references were good, Goodman said.

Petti might say, “I’m a big shot, I’m a gangster, I’ll take care of it,” Goodman said. But what resulted, Goodman said, was “the words but not the deeds.”

Further, Goodman said, Petti had no knowledge of money-laundering. “If a zero-coupon bond hit him in the face,” Goodman said, referring to the kind of bond used in the second deal, Petti “wouldn’t know it.”

Ahearn is due to testify today when the trial resumes. Goodman said that a focus of defense strategy would be to attack Ahearn’s credibility.

Petti is not expected to testify in the case, Goodman said. Both Gorder and Goodman said they hoped the trial would conclude by the end of next week.