BOSTON -- Federal officials said Tuesday they arrested and charged state Sen. Dianne Wilkerson with accepting more than $20,000 in bribes in exchange for her help securing a liquor license for a nightclub in her district.

Video | Undercover Photos | PDF: Criminal Complaint

Wilkerson, 53, a Democrat who represents the Second Suffolk Senate district, was charged in a federal criminal complaint with attempted extortion as a public official and theft of honest services as a state senator, said Christina DiIorio-Sterling, a spokeswoman for U.S Attorney Michael Sullivan.

During an initial court appearance Tuesday afternoon, the state said that Wilkerson has been "acting as if she is above the law," but her attorney, Max Stern said that it was "character assassination." An assistant U.S. Attorney said that when Wilkerson was arrested, officials found $6,000 in her purse. She was ordered held on a $50,000 bond.

According to a federal affidavit, Wilkerson, the only African-American member of the state Senate, was routinely taking "cash payments from constituents and others having business before the Senate."

Wilkerson allegedly accepted a total of $23,500 in cash payments, ranging in amounts from $500 to $10,000, from federal undercover agents posing as businessmen.

The affidavit alleges that Wilkerson was recorded by audio and videotape accepting bribes in exchange for her efforts to help obtain a non-transferable city liquor license for a proposed nightclub in the Crosstown Center on Melnea Cass Boulevard, in the city's Roxbury neighborhood.

Federal agents released photographs of Wilkerson allegedly accepting $500 in June 2007 from an undercover agent at the Scollay Square Restaurant on Beacon Hill in exchange for her help securing a liquor license for the Dejavu nightclub.

Other pictures allegedly show Wilkerson stuffing a $1,000 bribe in $100 bills into her bra at the No. 9 Park restaurant later in June, after she told the informant she had pressured the mayor's office on his behalf for the license.

Wilkerson was also photographed on several other occasions allegedly accepting cash bribes at the Fill-A-Buster restaurant on Beacon Hill. In one meeting, federal agents allege, Wilkerson brought her granddaughter along as she accepted a bribe.

The state senator allegedly took $8,500 in cash payments from the undercover agent, and a cooperating witness, between June 2007 and March 2008 to assist in obtaining the liquor license, according to the U.S. Attorney's office.

In exchange for the payments, Wilkerson allegedly pressured the Boston Licensing Board, the mayor and the City Council, and also held-up pending legislation in the State Senate that would have saved the city $500,000 in election costs.

According to the affidavit, Wilkerson boasted about her efforts to secure the license to an FBI informant saying, "I pushed this envelope farther than it's ever been pushed before," talking about the "people's knees I had to crack," to do it.

"I twisted these people's arms ... I've been beating people up," Wilkerson allegedly said as she talking about "calling in chits with the Mayor and the Licensing Commission. And, even going so far as to get a licensing board to approve a license for a(n) ... entity which doesn't have a location, which has never been done."

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino said Tuesday that he recalled Wilkerson lobbying him about the liquor license but was not suspicious because many people appeal to him every day on a wide variety of issues.

He said the FBI only informed him of the investigation on Monday and told him he was not a target of the sting.

He said he was "very disappointed," if the charges are true, that a state official would betray the public trust in such a manner.

The federal charges also accuse Wilkerson of holding up legislation that would have increased the salaries of members of the Boston Licensing Board as part of her efforts to get the license, according to the affidavit.

The licensing board eventually granted the Dejavu club a beer and wine license in August 2007 and a week later the Senate passed a bill giving the members of the Boston Licensing Board pay raises.

Wilkerson was allegedly paid another $1,000 at the Fill-A-Buster restaurant afterward, money that she said she would spend at the Foxwoods Casino spa that weekend. The FBI said it obtained records showing the senator did dine and gamble at the casino soon after.

“Public service is a honor,” said U.S. Attorney Michael J. Sullivan. “The allegations against Senator Wilkerson are unconscionable, and the citizens of the Commonwealth deserve honest and faithful services of their elected representatives -- uncompromised by secret payments of cash.”

The federal complaint also alleges that Wilkerson later introduced legislation to increase the number of new liquor licenses available in Boston, upping the amount to 40 new nontransferable licenses and 30 new nontransferable beer and wine licenses.

It also alleges that in January 2008, Wilkerson proposed that an undercover agent who was posing as out-of-state businessman become involved in the development of a piece of state property in Roxbury at the corner of Melnea Cass Boulevard and Harrison Avenue that included a large hardware store.

She allegedly told undercover agents that someone she knew had first rights to developing the property but he needed more "talent and muscle," to do it and he might be willing to sell his rights to them. He later estimated the value of a project on the parcel at about $100 million, the federal affidavit alleged.

Wilkerson then allegedly told undercover agents in meetings at Mooo restaurant on Beacon Hill that she could submit legislation to "directly designate" the property to a private entity for development, avoiding the ordinary public bidding process.

For doing so, federal officials alleged, she received a $5,000 payment in June 2008 and they charge that she received another $10,000 in cash in September and another $10,000 cash in October.

Wilkerson was allegedly pushing the projects in the House of Representatives and with the Boston Redevelopment Authority as recently as last week, the U.S. Attorney's office said.

If convicted of the corruption charges, Wilkerson faces up to 20 years imprisonment, three years of supervised release and a $250,000 fine on each of the charges.

During her court appearance, Wilkerson was told not to destroy any personal or campaign documents or any documents related to the case. She is scheduled to return to court on Nov. 17 for a pretrial hearing.

By Tuesday afternoon, Senate Minority Leader Richard R. Tisei was calling for Wilkerson's resignation.

"This has moved far beyond the sad transgressions of her past," said Tisei. "The latest charges brought against Senator Wilkerson rise to a whole new level, and significantly tarnish the reputation not only of the Massachusetts Senate, but government as a whole."

The federal charges are only the latest in a string of troubles for the veteran Massachusetts lawmaker elected in 1992. She has made the news over the years in connection with tax evasion and perjury charges.

The state Bar Counsel filed a complaint against Wilkerson within the last month, accusing her of lying under oath in an effort to overturn a nephew's manslaughter conviction.

Stern said the case was weak and unsupported by evidence.

The nephew, Jermaine Berry, was convicted of voluntary manslaughter in 1995 and again in a 2001 retrial.

The Bar Counsel, which investigates and prosecutes professional complaints against lawyers, filed a petition with the state Board of Bar Overseers last week alleging that Wilkerson signed a false affidavit and lied a the 2005 court hearing seeking a new trial for Berry.

The counsel alleged that Wilkerson repeatedly lied under oath when she claimed she was present when a distant cousin told police that he, rather than Berry, had fatally stabbed a woman named Hazel Mack in 1994.

A judge later ruled that Wilkerson's testimony that she was present during the interview did not jive with police recordings and records of the interview.

Wilkerson was suspended from practicing law for one year in 1999 after a tax evasion conviction and she did not seek a reinstatement.

Wilkerson recently lost in the October primary election to challenger Sonia Chang-Diaz, but has been campaigning as a write-in candidate for the general election.

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