Pellicano On Pellicano: He Was No Mastermind

LOS ANGELES — Defiant and colorful to the end, the accused Hollywood wiretapper Anthony Pellicano told jurors in his racketeering trial Wednesday that he was no criminal mastermind but a diligent private eye and a “lone ranger” who deliberately kept his accomplices in the dark.

“Pellicano alone is responsible,” he said, speaking of himself in the third person at the judge’s direction because he is representing himself. “That’s the simple truth.”

“He only allowed others to learn what he wanted them to,” he said. “He alone made all the decisions, protected all the secrets, protected all the clients.”

His bravado was part of a strategy: jurors might not conclude he was the leader of a criminal enterprise, as prosecutors contend, if they believe that his co-defendants did not know how he was using their assistance.

The co-defendants include a former police detective, Mark Arneson, who admitted illegally checking law enforcement databases hundreds of times for Mr. Pellicano; a former phone company worker, Rayford Turner, accused of helping him set up wiretaps; and a computer programmer, Kevin Kachikian, who admitted to helping design and build his wiretap system.

Though Mr. Pellicano, 64, is charged with wire and computer fraud, identity theft and other lesser offenses, he could live out his days behind bars if convicted of running a criminal enterprise.

Prosecutors called him a well-connected, “well-paid thug” as the eight-week trial wrapped up. But his self-image was more refined. “His job was problem-solving, through the acquisition of information,” he said in an 18-minute closing argument.

“In other words, winning: that’s what it was all about,” he said, ending the trial much as he began it, with boasts of his investigative prowess. “Perhaps his business card should’ve said, ‘I deliver,’ because that’s what he did, over and over again.”

He mounted no defense to the wiretapping case, instead saying ruefully that his secretly recorded calls, in which he discussed wiretaps with clients, “never were intended to be heard by anyone except Mr. Pellicano.” And they wouldn’t have been, he added, but for a search warrant and an F.B.I. technician’s discovery of a computer password.

But then, Mr. Pellicano mused, “There was a guy a long time ago by the name of Benjamin Franklin, and he said the only way you can keep a secret with three people involved is if two of the people are dead.”

Mr. Pellicano also hinted broadly that his methods were not a great mystery. “Anyone who hired him knew what they were getting, no doubt about it,” he said. He did not elaborate about clients like the talent manager Brad Grey (now the chairman of Paramount Pictures), the talent agent Michael S. Ovitz and the comedian Chris Rock; they all testified they knew nothing of his suspected illegal tactics.

He also said he never acknowledged his methods to lawyers because he could not trust them.

He minimized the value of the motor-vehicle and criminal records Mr. Arneson gave him. “Did those computer runs solve cases for him? Come on,” he said.

And he said that to find him guilty “means just about every other private eye in the country is also a criminal enterprise.” He smiled and added, waving to the gallery, “And maybe even some of these journalists out there.”

Finally, he told the jurors, who are expected to get the case on Thursday: “I guess I could sit up here trying to sway you one way or the other, but Mr. Pellicano instructed me not to do so.”

As the courtroom broke out in laughter, and the judge covered her face with her hand, he added, “And you know, when Mr. Pellicano instructs you to do something, you do it.”

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