Tucker Backs Wife as House Successor : Politics: Compton congressman attacks jury for conviction in bribery case.

One day after tendering his resignation from Congress, Rep. Walter R. Tucker III endorsed his wife for his seat and lashed out at the jury that convicted him last week of extortion and tax evasion.

Tucker, once considered a rising star from one of Compton’s best-known political families, backed his wife, Robin, as “the person who I know will help this community unify.”

“The deck was stacked from the very beginning,” said the two-term congressman, who is a lawyer and ordained minister. He has resigned his seat, effective Friday. Gov. Pete Wilson is expected to set a special election for a replacement.

Standing outside his district office in Compton under cloudy skies Wednesday, Tucker, 38, maintained, as he had at the trial, that he is the victim of government entrapment. Prosecutors in the case collected more than 30 hours of secretly recorded video and audiotapes that documented Tucker accepting $30,000 in bribes from John Macardican, a businessman-turned-informant.

Tucker, who is scheduled to be sentenced March 18, said he plans to devote time to helping his wife’s campaign and to writing a book, which he has entitled “To Catch a Rising Star.” Tucker’s critique of the case was somewhat overshadowed by the introduction of his wife as a candidate, which unleashed a flurry of speculation about who else might seek the seat. Robin Tucker has run a training program to increase the self-esteem of young people, and her husband said she has “the heart of the community.”

Assemblyman Willard H. Murray Jr. is the only candidate who has filed to run for the seat. But Assemblywoman Juanita M. McDonald (D-Carson) also is leaning toward a bid, according to her spokesman. Compton City Clerk Charles Davis, who has held his post for 23 years, said Wednesday that he too will seek Tucker’s job. Compton Mayor Omar Bradley’s name also has been mentioned.

A statement released late Tuesday from the office of retired Rep. Mervyn M. Dymally, one of California’s most prominent black politicians and Tucker’s predecessor, said he had been “swamped” with requests to enter the fray. But his son Mark said Wednesday that the veteran legislator is “definitely” not joining the race.

“The family is just dead-set against it,” Mark Dymally said. “I don’t think that people really understand that going to Congress is a significant physical, mental and emotional grind.”

Political observers and the candidates themselves are unsure of how the race will be run.

Wilson has several options. He could decide to set a special election, with the winner serving out the remainder of Tucker’s term, which ends next year. If he does that, the candidates might also have to compete at the same time in primaries to determine who would run in November’s general election.

“The only thing that could make this more bizarre,” said Los Angeles political consultant Joe Cerrell, “is if one family member challenges another family member.”

But as candidates scrambled to circulate their names, if only as rumored office-seekers, not all local leaders welcomed the increasingly crowded field of maybes.

Royce Esters, head of the Compton branch of the NAACP, dismissed the announcement about Robin Tucker.

“We need to get people who are qualified to run for these offices,” he said. “They are trying to keep it in the family. Is that the answer to Compton’s problems?”

Robin Tucker said her agenda would include intensifying efforts to make the 37th District’s streets safer; protecting Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security benefits, and improving economic conditions for residents.

“I am ready to fight for this community, I am ready to stand for this community, because I know there is something better for this community,” she said.

She said the trial had been “the most difficult time of our lives. And we are not finished yet . . . through difficulty comes power.”

Before introducing his wife, the congressman blasted the jury, comparing it to the Simi Valley panel that found four Los Angeles police officers not guilty of beating motorist Rodney G. King.