Scruggs' team files motion requesting 30 months

Attorney Dickie Scruggs' legal team filed a motion Wednesday afternoon that urges a federal judge to give Scruggs a sentence of 30 months rather than the maximum five years in prison he could serve for conspiring to bribe a state court judge.

The lengthy motion describes Scruggs' young life and his achievements as a Navy fighter pilot and a lawyer. It also quotes from some of the 248 letters about Scruggs sent to sentencing Judge Neal B. Biggers Jr. It say in part:

"Scruggs pleaded guilty and made clear to the Court he understands his culpability and the criminal nature of his conduct in furnishing funds to Judge (Henry) Lackey in exchange for an order in his favor on the arbitration motion. Moreover, those who know Scruggs have observed that he has accepted responsibility for his criminal conduct and is deeply ashamed for what he has done.

"William Reed, a law school classmate and friend, writes: It is beyond me to understand how a man of integrity, compassion and generosity could have made the poor decisions that Dickie admittedly made.

"However, I have talked at length to Dickie and believe that he fully accepts responsibility for those decisions and understands that he will be punished for doing so."

The government argues Scruggs should receive the 5-year maximum and his co-defendant, attorney Sidney Backstrom, should receive the 30 months recommended in a plea agreement he reached with the government.

The complicated federal sentencing calculations depend on the benefit Scruggs and his co-conspirators could have received from the bribe. One argument is the amount should be based on the $50,000 they offered Lackey. They paid Lackey to send to arbitration a Circuit Court lawsuit, the legal-fee dispute with Jackson attorney John Jones.

The government argues the calculation should instead be based on a figure of about $4 million - the amount the conspirators hoped to save. Jones wanted $5.3 million, but they wanted to pay him only $1.2 million for his work on policyholders' Hurricane Katrina lawsuits against State Farm.