Dickie Scruggs takes case to 5th Circuit today

Dickie Scruggs takes case to 5th Circuit today

A three-judge panel will hear on Monday former Oxford attorney Richard “Dickie” Scruggs’ appeal on his 2008 guilty plea that he improperly influenced Judge Bobby DeLaughter.

Attorneys for Scruggs, 66, will seek to convince the judges his offer to help DeLaughter’s pursuit of a federal judgeship was not a bribe but protected “political speech.”

The appeal goes to New Orleans after Senior U.S. District Judge Glen H. Davidson denied it in May 2012.

Late last year, Davidson granted Scruggs bail and a temporary reprieve from beginning the DeLaughter sentence while the 5th Circuit considers the appeal.

Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal
3/3/13