Cult Siege Spotlights Attorney -- But Dick Deguerin's Already A Legal `Name'

WACO, Texas - His role in the Branch Davidian standoff is not the first time Houston defense lawyer Dick DeGuerin has been in the limelight.

Federal agents have made DeGuerin a center of attention by allowing him into the cult compound to talk directly with Branch Davidian leader David Koresh, whose mother hired DeGuerin in the case.

Koresh, a doomsday preacher who has claimed to be Jesus Christ, has been holed up with followers since a Feb. 28 gunfight that killed four federal agents and at least two cultists. By Koresh's count, 96 followers are still with him in the compound.

Guerin was meeting with Koresh again today. The FBI said it was halting negotiations while the private talks continued.

"At this point, we're wishing him nothing but great success," FBI agent Bob Ricks said.

But the 52-year-old former partner of the late Percy Foreman - one of Houston's most famous defense lawyers - has been a high-profile, highly paid, sometimes high-society defense lawyer in Houston for years.

SOLID REPUTATION

Before the cult standoff, he was known in Waco for defending Muneer Deeb, a convenience-store operator retried and acquitted in a notorious capital-murder case. A Fort Worth jury acquitted Deeb in January after he had spent six years on death row for the 1982 slashing murders of three Waco-area teenagers.

"He's a very talented trial lawyer," said Mike Hinton, a Houston defense lawyer who once worked as an assistant district attorney. "He is very aggressive. He's well-prepared. He's intense. He's bright. No one has ever referred to Dick as afraid of anything."

State District Judge Joe Kegans contrasted DeGuerin with his mentor, Foreman.

"Percy had that compelling personality and that ability to take a courtroom literally in his hands," Kegans said. "Dick is real thorough, but he's not flashy."

Even so, DeGuerin has a certain style. He jogs with his black Labrador retriever, has been seen driving a gold Mercedes Benz and has made at least one best-dressed list in Houston.

In a 1989 profile, Texas Lawyer reported that DeGuerin regularly charges $100,000 for his services.

DeGuerin had a long winning streak in the 1980s, but lately he has lost some cases.

He represented a lawyer convicted of buying babies in an adoption business. He represented a former policeman convicted of raping a handcuffed prisoner. His client in a pair of love-triangle stabbing deaths received a life sentence in a plea bargain.

DeGuerin's involvement in the Waco cult standoff "is real unusual," said Chuck Rosenthal, a Harris County assistant district attorney who has handled similar situations in Houston. Usually, "there's very little negotiation between any client and law enforcement officers prior to arrest."

But parts of the situation will be familiar to DeGuerin, said Joe Magliolo, a former Harris County assistant district attorney who is now an assistant U.S. attorney in Houston.

"Ninety percent of a defense-lawyer's job is negotiation," Magliolo said. "Most cases are pled. It's only when negotiations break down that you go to trial."

Hinton said there is no inherent conflict in DeGuerin's going into the compound to talk to his client. But Rosenthal said DeGuerin could be risking his role as a defense lawyer. "You could put yourself in a position of not being able to be a lawyer if you're a witness to various aspects of the case," Rosenthal said.

Fellow defense lawyer Allen Isbell of Houston said he didn't see much risk of DeGuerin becoming a witness rather than a lawyer because lawyers always investigate their cases and have information prosecutors would like.

He also said he doubted there had been any negotiation of outcome between DeGuerin and the federal officials.

"That would be sort of risky for everybody. It's been a botched deal already. I can't imagine the federal government with dead agents on their hands agreeing to anything Dick would agree to. Maybe it's negotiating the surrender," Isbell said.

The FBI's Ricks said the agency is neither directing DeGuerin nor listening to the talks. During the first meeting Monday, federal agents moved 75 yards away from the porch where DeGuerin sat. For yesterday's meeting, the attorney went inside the sect's compound.

`SUBSTANTIVE' MEETINGS

DeGuerin said he was hopeful his discussions would bring a peaceful end to the stalemate. He told federal agents that the first meeting was "substantive," Ricks said.

DeGuerin tried to visit the compound shortly after he was hired a month ago but was not allowed to.

His meeting Monday was the first time since shortly after the siege began that a third party had been allowed to communicate directly with cult members in the compound. Federal authorities cut the cult's telephone communications with the outside world a couple of days after the standoff began, and since then the cult's phone has been used only for talking with law enforcement officials.

Ricks said DeGuerin had not elaborated on his discussions with Koresh. But he has told authorities they have focused on "substantive issues," such as Koresh's rights and how he will be treated by the justice system.