Lawyer for Kerkorian to Remain, Judge Says

A judge ruled Wednesday that prominent entertainment attorney Terry N. Christensen can continue to represent billionaire Kirk Kerkorian in a bitter child-support dispute with his ex-wife, despite the lawyer’s indictment in the Anthony Pellicano wiretapping case.

Attorneys for Lisa Bonder Kerkorian argued that Christensen should be disqualified from the case because he was indicted last month on wiretapping and conspiracy charges. He allegedly paid Pellicano at least $100,000 to illegally eavesdrop on more than two dozen phone conversations between their client, her attorney and others.

Federal prosecutors say Pellicano allegedly told Christensen about a series of Bonder Kerkorian’s phone calls between March and May 2002, including a conversation in which she supposedly identified the biological father of the couple’s daughter, Kira.

Bonder Kerkorian’s lawyers, who are seeking $250,000 in legal fees, also asked the judge to increase Kerkorian’s monthly child-support payments from $50,000 to $75,000.

Although she called the accusations presented in court “a compelling story,” Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Marjorie Steinberg ruled that Christensen and his firm could not be disqualified on the basis of the federal indictment alone.

“That is not going to get you where you need to go,” Steinberg said, referring to the federal charges. “I need to have a higher standard than that to disqualify” him.

She invited Bonder Kerkorian’s lawyers to continue to gather evidence to support their claim.

Steinberg left the door open for the parties -- through mediation and possibly the courts -- to revisit the terms of the couple’s 2002 child-support case that are at the center of the allegations against Christensen.

Christensen, 65, is one of 13 people who have been charged in the broadening FBI probe into alleged bribery of law enforcement officers, high-tech eavesdropping, blackmail, witness intimidation and other bids to corrupt the judicial system.

Christensen, Kerkorian’s longtime lawyer and business partner, has pleaded not guilty to the federal charges. His attorneys say the lawyer turned to Pellicano to investigate threats against Kerkorian and the couple’s daughter.

Bonder Kerkorian, 40, was married to Kerkorian for a month. She originally sought $320,000 a month in child support for Kira, whose paternity was in dispute.

Multimillionaire film producer Steve Bing later sued Kerkorian, claiming that he had hired someone to dig through his trash for DNA evidence that Bing was Kira’s father.

Kerkorian’s paternity was ultimately disproved, and he and Bing later resolved their differences without publicly disclosing the identity of the father.