Mayor Testifies About His Ties to Broker in Investment Fraud Case : Courts: Bradley says he was initially fond of the defendant, but his opinion changed after he asked for an explanation of his losses in futures trading.

Mayor Tom Bradley testified at the fraud trial of a former Beverly Hills commodities broker Wednesday, saying he invested in high-risk futures contracts with the defendant for five years, breaking off contact in 1987 after he lost money.

Bradley testified in Van Nuys Superior Court at the trial of Mark R. Weinberg, 37, confirming Weinberg’s claim that he knew Bradley well but also casting doubt on Weinberg’s trustworthiness.

Bradley said he was initially fond of Weinberg, who donated $84,000 to Bradley’s campaign in the mid-1980s, and even introduced Weinberg to former Vice President Walter Mondale.

But the mayor said that in 1987, when he demanded paperwork to explain investment losses that he said were “less than $25,000,” Weinberg made statements that “bordered on those of a pathological liar.”

Weinberg, a high-living broker who cultivated friends in high places at the same time that he was infiltrating a New York organized crime family on behalf of the FBI, is accused of defrauding wealthy investors in 1988 and 1989 of more than $1 million by promising them profits of 25% or more within days if they invested in foreign currency trades.

Weinberg, who is representing himself in the case, was allowed to call Bradley to counter suggestions by prosecution witnesses that he had falsely claimed to be friendly with high elected officials in order to lure investors into high-risk ventures.

Earlier, Judge John S. Fisher allowed Weinberg to call Dist. Atty. Ira Reiner, who acknowledged on the stand that he and his wife socialized with Weinberg and his wife and that they went to the 1984 Olympics together. Weinberg that year contributed more than $250,000 to Reiner’s successful campaign to unseat Dist. Atty. Robert H. Philibosian--nearly one-quarter of Reiner’s funds for that campaign.

But Reiner said that in 1985, on learning that Weinberg was the subject of a criminal investigation, he broke off contact with him. No charges were filed in that investigation.

U. S. Sen. Alan Cranston, to whose campaigns Weinberg contributed $54,000, also has been subpoenaed to testify.

On the stand Wednesday, the mayor also said that in 1985 he was briefed by two FBI agents on Weinberg.

Bradley was not asked what the session was about and refused to be interviewed outside court, but an FBI agent testified last week that he told the mayor at the 1985 meeting that Weinberg had infiltrated the Genovese crime family in New York on behalf of the bureau.

The testimony by Special Agent Robert M. Hamer was the first time the bureau had corroborated Weinberg’s contention--made in many news stories since 1985--that he had been marked for death by the Genovese crime family after luring mobsters to invest at his Westwood brokerage.

Hamer said the bureau accepted Weinberg’s offer to help, hoping to trick organized crime leaders into investing openly so their funds could be seized on the grounds that the money was gathered through crime.

The scheme was abandoned in December, 1984, because the bureau was unable to trace the source of the $5 million to $10 million in Genovese family money in Weinberg’s brokerage accounts, Hamer said.

The agent said that Weinberg continued to give information to the FBI through 1989. He was not asked on the stand about Weinberg’s more recent work for the bureau and declined to discuss the subject outside court.

Fisher ruled that Hamer’s testimony was admissible because prosecution witnesses had said on the stand that Weinberg’s license to trade domestic commodities was suspended in 1985 when federal securities regulators learned that his clients included Matthew (Matty the Horse) Ianello, Anthony (Fat Tony) Salerno and other alleged mobsters.

Deputy Atty. Gen. Tricia Ann Bigelow has sought to quash subpoenas for Bradley, Reiner and Cranston, as well as those served on FBI agents, saying their testimony has no relevance to the charges.

Among the victims of the alleged fraud are James Aubrey, former president of CBS who invested $100,000 with Weinberg, and John Paul Jones De Joria, president of John Paul Mitchell Systems, a Santa Clarita-based hair products company, who said he lost $450,000 invested with Weinberg.

Weinberg contends that he was the victim of business reversals and was working to pay back all investors when he was charged.

He faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted of four counts of fraud and eight bad check charges.