ATTORNEY GERAGOS DRAWS A CROWD
By Michael Hinkelman

Philadelphia Daily News, PA
l
hinkelm@phillynews.com 215-854-2656
July 18 2007

One legal journal calls him one of the country’s "marquee" lawyers.

And Los Angeles attorney Mark Geragos has the client list to back up
the lofty description.

He’s defended pop star Michael Jackson, Academy Award-winning actress
Winona Ryder, ex-California Congressman Gary Condit and convicted
wife-killer Scott Peterson.

Just last week, a federal judge in California removed him from the
case of a defense contractor charged with fraud because he refused
to submit to a background check that would have allowed him to see
classified information.

Now, Geragos is in federal court here, defending a man who is charged
with traveling overseas to have sex with young boys.

During the trial’s opening yesterday, the courtroom was packed with
spectators.

Most of them – some aspiring lawyers – were there to see Geragos.

One of Geragos’ first major cases, in 1992, was defending Susan
McDougal, a former business partner of Bill Clinton in the Whitewater
land deal.

He won back-to-back state and federal-court jury-trial acquittals for
McDougal after she had been convicted and imprisoned before Geragos
represented her.

Geragos, 49, a lanky man with a taste for fine clothes, is no stranger
to Philadelphia.

He is a graduate of Haverford College.

He was also one of the lead lawyers in a pair of federal class-action
lawsuits against two life-insurance companies for not paying out on
policies issued to Armenians that had been written before and during
the purported genocide committed by the Turks against Armenians during
World War I.

The two cases settled for over $37.5 million. A plaintiff in one of
the cases was a Philadelphian, George Yacoubian. *
From: Baghdasarian