Texas prosecutors probe possible Cunningham-DeLay cash link

SAN DIEGO – The Texas prosecutor targeting Rep. Tom DeLay has issued a second round of subpoenas to businessmen here seeking records surrounding donations to the former Republican leader and disgraced former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham.

The subpoenas issued by Travis County District Attorney Ronnie Earle's office zero in on transactions in 2002 involving PerfectWave Technologies LLC, a company controlled by Brent Wilkes, a businessman with ties to DeLay and Cunningham.

Wilkes' attorney has identified him as an unidentified co-conspirator of Cunningham, a California Republican who resigned from Congress after pleading guilty in November to accepting $2.4 million in bribes from defense contractors.

DeLay, charged with conspiring to launder campaign money that was given in 2002 for legislative races in his home state of Texas, flew three times on a jet owned by another Wilkes company, according to campaign records.

According to the subpoenas, businessman William B. Adams wrote a $40,000 check to PerfectWave on Sept. 18, 2002. Two days later, PerfectWave sent $15,000 to TRMPAC, the state committee whose spending is at issue in DeLay's criminal case. On Oct. 3, PerfectWave gave $25,000 to "Tribute to Heroes," Cunningham's annual black-tie charity gala in San Diego.

Wilkes' charitable foundation spent nearly $36,000 hosting "Tribute to Heroes" in 2002. Cunningham, a former Vietnam war fighter ace, was feted with a trophy at the event, according to the event's Web site and tax filings.

Subpoenas were issued last week to Adams and Max Gelwix, PerfectWave's president and CEO. The subpoenas sought records of any communications between DeLay, Cunningham, House Majority Whip Roy Blount of Missouri and Wilkes over federal legislation that may have benefited Adams and his businesses.

Matt Hennessy, an attorney for DeLay, said the latest subpoenas were not worth the paper they were printed on. Cunningham's lawyer, Lee Blalack, did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Adams, a golf course developer who lives in suburban San Diego, gave $5,000 in 2002 both to Delay's Americans for a Republican Majority PAC and Blount's Rely on Your Beliefs fund, according to campaign finance records.

Earle's office, which did not return a message left seeking comment, also issued subpoenas regarding a $10,000 contribution received by a San Diego YMCA that may have come from an Idaho mining company.

According to the subpoenas, Atlas Mining Co. of Osburn, Idaho, wired $10,000 to PerfectWave on Oct. 24, 2002 — the same day PerfectWave cut a $10,000 check to the Copley Family YMCA, named for the family that publishes The San Diego Union-Tribune and other newspapers. Wilkes, whose foundation gave an additional $15,000 to the Copley YMCA in 2002, was named its man of the year.

But Ron Short, Atlas Mining's operations manager, said Tuesday that he could find no record that money was wired to PerfectWave and added that he had never heard of PerfectWave or Wilkes.

"We didn't have $10,000 to give away three years ago," Short said.

Also named in the subpoenas was San Diego attorney Paul E. Smithers, who co-signed checks from PerfectWave to TRMPAC and Tribute to Heroes. Smithers did not return a message seeking comment.