Tucker Demanded Funds, Witness Says : Courts: Company head says ex-mayor sought campaign contributions before contract talks.

When she assumed control of her late husband’s rubbish hauling business in Compton in 1991, Jasmine Mgrdichian inherited a crisis she did not foresee--an extortion demand from then-Mayor Walter R. Tucker III, she testified Friday.

“I was furious. I thought it was blackmail,” she told federal court jurors in Tucker’s extortion and tax evasion trial.

She resisted at first, she said, but agreed to pay $5,000 to ensure the mayor’s vote in support of a rate increase for her company, Murcole Disposal, the city’s residential garbage collector.

Tucker voted yes when the City Council awarded the company a rate increase in September, 1991.

In 1992, Murcole sought an extension of its contract, and Mgrdichian testified that she was pressured to pay an additional $2,500 for Tucker’s vote.

“I was between a rock and a hard place,” she said. “So we paid.”

Tucker voted to grant the extension.

Under cross-examination, Mgrdichian admitted that her information about Tucker’s alleged demands came secondhand from her business manager, Mikael Aloyan, who handled dealings with City Hall.

Aloyan testified Friday that his initial information came from an intermediary, Jesse Robinson, who has since died.

However, Aloyan did say that Tucker asked for campaign contributions almost every time they talked about Murcole’s contract requests.

Aloyan said that before each one was considered, Tucker asked to meet privately with Robinson, described in court as a well-known figure in Compton who did public relations work for Murcole.

After his private meetings with the mayor, Robinson reported back, Aloyan said, telling him how much money Tucker wanted in exchange for his vote.

The $5,000 payment was made by company check Aug. 20, 1991, to Friends of Walter Tucker III, a campaign fund. Mgrdichian said Tucker specified to whom the check should be written.

In 1992, she said, he wanted the $2,500 paid in cash but she balked and insisted on sending him a check “because I wanted a paper trail.”

Mgrdichian wrote the check to Tucker’s congressional campaign fund. Because federal law bars congressional candidates from receiving corporate contributions, Tucker asked that Murcole issue another check for $2,500 payable to his wife, Robin, Aloyan testified.

Under questioning by Assistant U.S. Atty. John M. Potter, Mgrdichian said Robin Tucker never worked or performed any services for the rubbish hauler.

Mgrdichian testified that before she agreed to send the new check, she insisted that Tucker’s campaign reimburse her for the first one, which had been deposited.

On June 2, 1992, Tucker’s campaign committee sent Murcole a $2,500 check and two days later Murcole released a $2,500 check payable to Robin Tucker.

But when Mgrdichian tried to deposit the reimbursement check, she said, the bank informed her that payment had been stopped.

“I was furious,” she testified. She said she told Aloyan: “That SOB wants $5,000.”

So, she said, she sent Aloyan to see Tucker with a warning that “I didn’t care what happened, that I would blow the whole thing wide open about his extorting money from me.”

Two weeks later, Mgrdichian got her $2,500 back and she kept her silence--until the FBI came calling two years later.

Tucker is also charged with extorting $30,000 and demanding $250,000 in kickbacks from Compton Energy Systems.