He was once the mayor of Waterbury who ran unsuccessfully for
the U.S. Senate and had his eye on a presidential appointment.
Instead, Philip Giordano has been sitting in federal prison for
the past decade, serving a 37-year term for forcing the 8-year-
old and 10-year-old female relatives of a crack-addicted
prostitute to perform oral sex on him in various places,
including a police car, his law office and City Hall.  Now,
after two unsuccessful bids to overturn his conviction, vacate
or reduce his sentence that went all the way to the U.S. Supreme
Court, Giordano is once again trying to reverse his fate by
claiming ineffective assistance at trial by his then-lawyer
Andrew Bowman of Westport.  On Monday, U.S. District Judge
Stefan R. Underhill will hear legal arguments on that matter
before determining if an evidentiary hearing, in which Bowman
and others would be required to testify, is necessary.  Such a
hearing would be similar to the one recently conducted in state
court for Michael Skakel.  Skakel, a Ken