Imprisoned former lawmaker John Sampson plans to plead guilty Friday to outstanding embezzlement charges, new court filings reveal. The former state Senator was tried and…
Imprisoned former lawmaker John Sampson plans to plead guilty Friday to outstanding embezzlement charges, new court filings reveal.
The former state Senator was tried and convicted in 2015 on charges of obstruction of justice and lying to the FBI. Yet jurors never heard evidence that he’d pocketed some $400,000 from foreclosure escrow accounts he was meant to oversee because federal judge Dora Irizarry tossed the charges, saying they weren’t supported under the law.
Irizarry’s decision was reversed earlier this year, when a higher court reinstated the counts against the disgraced Democrat .
Yet new court papers show Sampson intends to enter a guilty plea Friday to both embezzlement counts, with prosecutors recommending Irizarry sentence him to 5 years behind bars for the theft.
Sampson has so far served out almost a year and a half of the 5-year sentence Irizzary handed him in 2017 following the jury’s guilty verdict.
In their letter to the judge, prosecutors recommended she rule his new sentence run concurrently with his present incarceration .
As part of the proposed plea agreement, Sampson would also have to pay back the $440,000 he’s accused of pocketing during the 1990s.
Sampson’s defense attorney Nick Akerman declined to comment.
