NEW YORK (Reuters) - A domestic consultant convicted of hidden scarcely $1 million from New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg during his 2009 re-election debate was condemned to between 1 1/3 and 4 years in jail Monday in state Supreme Court.
Prosecutors from a Manhattan District Attorney's Office had indicted John Haggerty of soliciting $1.1 million in supports from a billionaire mayor to compensate for an endless poll-watching operation that never materialized. Instead, they claimed, Haggerty used a bulk of a income he perceived to buy his childhood home.
Haggerty was convicted of second-degree robbery and money laundering following a four-week hearing in Oct though clear him of a some-more critical robbery charge.
In a brief matter to a justice before his sentencing on Monday, Haggerty pronounced he regretted his actions.
Bloomberg, a domestic independent, won a third tenure in 2009 after successfully overturning a two-term extent on city mayors.
Prosecutors endorsed a judgment of 4 to 12 years in jail though Haggerty's lawyers, Raymond Castello and Dennis Vacco, argued that a judgment of hearing and village use would be some-more suitable for what they described as an removed incident.
Haggerty, who finished adult with $750,000 of a mayor's money, has concluded to sell a home he bought and lapse a stolen funds, lawyers on both sides pronounced Monday.
Haggerty was a businessman operative on interest of a Independence Party, that upheld Bloomberg's candidacy. The celebration also has concluded to pledge $150,000 of a funds, Assistant District Attorney Eric Seidel pronounced Monday, nonetheless it will not have to lapse approximately $200,000 it had already spent during a time of Haggerty's indictment.
BLOOMBERG ON STAND
The hearing supposing a singular sight, as Bloomberg - along with a march of his many devoted aides, many of whom have hold absolute positions in City Hall - testified opposite Haggerty.
Under assertive doubt from Haggerty's lawyers, Bloomberg confirmed his restraint though was forced to plead a spending on his self-financed $105 million campaign.
Haggerty's lawyers sought to paint their customer as a plant for a win-at-all-costs mayor who did not caring either a poll-watching operation took place, as prolonged as he stayed in power.
They also suggested a mayor's preference to flue a income by a Independence Party, rather than compensate Haggerty directly, was an try to censor a purpose in profitable for check watching, that Democrats have criticized in a past as a form of voter suppression.
By willingly giving a income to a party, a lawyers argued, a mayor had effectively given adult control of it and therefore could not be a plant of theft.
Prosecutors asserted that a mayor and his aides would never have sealed off on a output but assurances from Haggerty that it would account an Election Day operation. They forked to a bill Haggerty due that enclosed 1,355 check watchers, a request that Seidel labeled "pure fiction" during a trial.
(Reporting by Joseph Ax; Editing by Edith Honan and Bill Trott)
News referensi http://news.yahoo.com/consultant-stole-bloomberg-sentenced-jail-202217110.html
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