Last week trial lawyer Richard F. Scruggs, chief architect of the $206 billion nationwide tobacco settlement in the 1990s, pleaded guilty yesterday to conspiring to bribe a judge in another case.

Scruggs and Sidney A. Backstrom, a lawyer in his firm, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud for offering a $50,000 cash bribe to a Mississippi judge in exchange for a favorable ruling in a dispute over legal fees from a Hurricane Katrina insurance lawsuit.

In return for Scruggs's guilty plea in U.S. District Court in Oxford, Miss., federal prosecutors will recommend that several other charges against him be dropped. No sentencing date was set. Prosecutors are asking that Scruggs be sentenced to the maximum of five years in prison. He will also lose his license to practice law.

Scruggs, brother in law of former Senator Trent Lott, is also under investigation of undue influence over a Mississippi judge.

Today, Zach Scruggs pled guilty to "misprison of a felony", bringing to an end the prosecution of one of the most famous plaintiff's law firm in recent history. The plea was to a federal felony charge that he was aware of but did not report that his father and associates were inappropriately trying to influence a Mississippi judge. The plea deal is likely to include probation instead of jail time.