The Nation - News from Jan. 27, 1988

Defense lawyers raised doubts about whether former White House aide Lyn Nofziger personally signed a letter that helps support an illegal-lobbying charge against him and his business partner, Mark A. Bragg. Stephen Denlinger, a trade association executive who had retained the Nofziger-Bragg lobbying firm in 1982, testified in federal court in Washington that he drafted the letter to a White House official at Bragg’s direction. Questioned by the defense, he denied that he forged Nofziger’s signature while Nofziger was at home recovering from a stroke. Denlinger conceded he did not know firsthand that Nofziger actually signed the letter. Nofziger has said he cannot remember signing the May 28, 1982, letter, which urged then-deputy presidential counselor James E. Jenkins to obtain written assurances that the Army intended to award an engine contract to Welbilt Electronic Die Corp., later renamed Wedtech.