It would seem that any questions about that corruption were settled when the former congressman departed for federal prison last year. But some were still unable to fully grasp the extent of the corruption and believed that this Vietnam hero was at least partially a victim of unscrupulous Washington operators.

But no more; not after the FBI's 11-page summary of prison interviews with Cunningham earlier this year; and not after a 75-page affidavit filed by the FBI that detail the depths of the corruption and the ways that Cunningham personally orchestrated the bribes and made demands upon demands of the contractors willing to pay him to steer federal money their way.

Both documents were obtained last week by Copley News Service and detailed in Wednesday's San Diego Union-Tribune.

One who read the story was a Carlsbad man who worked under Cunningham in the Navy, a longtime admirer who had been clinging to the faint hope that the corruption was not truly deep-seated.

That hope died for Tom Reid as he carefully read the FBI documents available through the Union-Tribune Web site. “Those two documents hit me like a ton of bricks,” he said.

Reid, who retired from the Navy in 1995 after a career that included a stint at the Pentagon working for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, served at Miramar Naval Air Station, where Cunningham was his superior officer.

He was reluctant to accept Cunningham's corruption until he read of the documents and interview.

“I was sickened, appalled, disappointed,” Reid said. “Oh man, the details really brought it home.”

The longtime Republican congressman from Rancho Santa Fe is serving an eight-year, four-month sentence after admitting to accepting more than $2.4 million in bribes. He pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy and tax evasion.

Reid said when the scandal unfolded in 2005 he was stunned but said, “I'll just reserve judgment 'til there are more facts because it's hard for me to believe that Duke would have changed this much. But now there's no more questions after reading these documents.”

In Washington, the new documents also had an impact last week.

“It's breathtaking to imagine that we had a guy who was so corrupt to his bones,” said Norman J. Ornstein, an expert on Congress at the American Enterprise Institute and author of books on Congress.

“These documents show that there was almost a zealousness about the notion that, boy, he had found a gravy train and he was going to ride that gravy train right off into the sunset.”

Ornstein said the disclosures put pressure on Congress to revive an ethics committee that fell into disuse.

“This takes us back to some of the problems when . . . you decide you are going to abandon any ethics process. This is the result,” Ornstein said. “This is a cautionary note as they look to fixing the ethics process right now.”