Memorabilia Promoter Withdraws Guilty Plea

A sports promoter accused of writing bad checks to baseball players, including Mickey Mantle, Steve Garvey and Don Drysdale, withdrew his guilty plea Friday in his fraud case.

Paul Howard Hammack, 44, is charged with 19 felonies and one misdemeanor stemming from a memorabilia show he staged at the Pasadena Center in 1990.

Prosecutors said celebrities and collectors lost more than $200,000 after Hammack allegedly wrote bad checks and failed to return signed memorabilia.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Nancy Naftel said she is hopeful that Hammack will agree to another plea agreement before he is scheduled to appear in court on Jan. 21.

A judge allowed him to withdraw his plea because of complications introduced when an appeals court set aside a previous guilty plea in a related case, Naftel said. Hammack pleaded guilty to wire fraud in U.S. District Court last July and was sentenced to eight years in prison. He appealed the conviction, alleging he was misinformed about the maximum prison term he faced, the prosecutor said.