Posted on 03/17/2006 10:15:43 PM PST by nickcarraway
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A California man on Friday admitted paying ex-private eye Anthony Pellicano to intercept phone calls, becoming the first defendant to say in open court he hired Pellicano to engage in wiretapping.
George Kalta, one of 13 people charged so far in the federal wiretap case surrounding Pellicano that has become a major scandal in Tinseltown, implicated the Hollywood sleuth before a federal judge as he pleaded guilty to conspiracy.
The 37-year-old owner of a wholesale lighting business was accused in a U.S. District Court indictment of paying Pellicano $25,000 in 2001 to eavesdrop on a woman who had accused him of sexual assault.
"Your honor, I hired Mr. Pellicano because he told me that he could listen in to (the woman's) phone calls in hopes that he could get a conversation proving my innocence," Kalta said.
Kalta pleaded guilty under a deal with prosecutors, but the terms of that agreement were sealed and it was unclear if he had agreed to cooperate in the investigation. He is expected to face about a year in prison.
Pellicano, who has worked for some of the biggest names in Hollywood, was charged in a 110-count indictment of illegally wiretapping and obtaining the confidential records of performers, journalists and business executives.
He has pleaded not guilty to the conspiracy and racketeering indictment, which was unsealed just before he completed a 30-month stretch in federal prison for firearms violations.
The former private detective faces up to 20 years behind bars on each of the racketeering charges.
Among those whose privacy he is accused of breaching through wiretaps or illicit database searches were entertainers Sylvester Stallone, Garry Shandling, Kevin Nealon and Keith Carradine, as well as billionaire Kirk Kerkorian's ex-wife, Lisa Bonder Kerkorian, and a former New York Times reporter.
Kerkorian's longtime lawyer, Terry Christensen, whose firm has represented Barbra Streisand, Elton John, Sean Connery and Kim Basinger, has also been indicted and pleaded innocent. Prosecutors say they expect more charges soon in the investigation.
Former Beverly Hills police officer Craig Stevens and Carradine's ex-wife, Sandra Will Carradine, pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators in the case. They were not accused of hiring Pellicano to wire-tap.
I believe just about everything written about Pellicano. He's seriously scummy.
Hey Tony...roll over on the beast, you will be safer once the truth is known.
11/23/02
Hillary's Private Eye Arrested in Reporter Intimidation Case
I found this on a Rush Limbaugh newsgroup:
A California private detective who worked to discredit Clinton Sexgate accusers Monica Lewinsky and Gennifer Flowers has been arrested in connection with attempts to intimidate a reporter for the Los Angeles Times after the FBI caught him with an arsenal of explosives.
Anthony J. Pellicano was arrested Thursday after a search of his office by a dozen FBI agents turned up an "array of explosives," reported New York's Daily News on Saturday.
In February, New York Sen. Hillary Clinton was alleged to have hired Pellicano in 1992 in an attempt to discredit Gennifer Flowers' claims of a twelve year affair with Mr. Clinton.
The episode bears an eerie resemblance to the account of Clinton sex-accuser Sally Perdue, who told the London Telegraph in 1994 that after she was threatened with physical violence, her car windshield was broken and spent shotgun shell was left on the seat. Perdue abruptly relocated to China a few months after talking to the Telegraph, shortly after Paula Jones sued Mr. Clinton for sexual harassment.
Though Pellicano's name never surfaced in connection with Perdue's allegations, he reportedly played a key role in attempts to discredit both Monica Lewinsky and Gennifer Flowers.
Four days after the Lewinsky story broke in Jan. 1998, ex-Lewinsky boyfriend Andy Bleiler came forward with the claim that she had stalked him. The Washington state school teacher also contended that Lewinsky wanted to become a White House intern so she could perform oral sex on then-President Clinton. "I'm going to Washington to get my presidential knee pads," Bleiler's lawyer, Terry Giles, quoted Lewinsky as saying.
Ah yes, Pellicano, the Hitlery's bimbo eruption get the dirt on them boy.
He's admitted to carrying a baseball bat to intimidate people on behalf of his clients. His original Federal conviction was for possessing military C-4 explosives and two practice grenades that he'd filled with explosive and rearmed, making them live grenades. His Hollyweird nickname is the "Pelican," a type of nickname only given to Mafia associates and button men. There's no way the baseball bat, explosives, and live grenades were going to be used for anything other than illegal mayhem, probably including murder, if the felt that necessary.
This bird was the Clintons' favorite PI. In addition to doing ordinary PI work, what do you want to be he did the Vince Foster job, along with many others for the Clintons.
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