Keating and Wurzelbacher

Wurzelbacher cannot be a common name. So, is it possible that Joe the Plumber is a plant.

December 13, 1993

Keating Son-in-Law to Serve Prison Term

A son-in-law of the former head of Lincoln Savings, Charles H. Keating Jr., must surrender next year to begin a 40-month prison sentence.

United States District Judge Mariana R. Pfaelzer imposed the sentence last week on the son-in-law, Robert M. Wurzelbacher Jr., who had pleaded guilty to three counts of misapplying $14 million from Lincoln, an Irvine, Calif., savings association.

Mr. Wurzelbacher, 39, was an executive with Lincoln's parent, the American Continental Corporation, which Mr. Keating controlled.

Prosecutors asked for a six-year sentence, saying Mr. Wurzelbacher had volunteered little of use to them after making a plea bargain.

Mr. Wurzelbacher's lawyer, Mark Beck, had asked for probation and community service. He said Mr. Wurzelbacher was likely to serve 26 months before parole.

On Tuesday, Judge Pfaelzer ordered Mr. Wurzelbacher to begin his sentence on Feb. 4. She said she would recommend that he be sent to prison camp at Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada.

Mr. Wurzelbacher did not plead guilty to the indictment charging him and others, including Mr. Keating and Mr. Keating's son, with looting Lincoln and swindling investors who lost money buying risky bonds. Instead, he admitted that he helped Lincoln extend loans to a hotel partnership in which he, Mr. Keating and other insiders had interests. He said he knew the loans were unlikely to be repaid.

Lincoln's failure in April 1989 cost taxpayers $3.4 billion, a record.

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The Nazis, Fascists and Communists were political parties before they became enemies of liberty and mass murderers.