Former Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver was sentenced to 12 year in prison and told by a federal judge that he must give back $5 million dollars that he stole from the public, as well a pay another $1.75 million dollars in fines.
Over 100 family members, constituents and lobbyists wrote letters on behalf of the disgraced former Assembly Speaker, and the disgraced former Speaker and his lawyers pleaded for mercy, but despite that, the Judge sentenced Silver to 12 years in prison ,and ordered that he pay back $5 million dollars he gained from illegal kickback schemes, as well as a $1.75 million dollar fine.
Dick Dadey, with the reform group Citizens Union, who waited outside the court room to hear the sentence, says it’s just deserts for what Silver did.
“It’s a strong and appropriate sentence,” Dadey said.
US Attorney PreetBharara, who brought the case, tweeted that the “stiff sentence is a just and fitting end to Sheldon Silver's long career of corruption”.
In November, Silver, 72, was convicted of 7 counts of corruption charges which includs two counts of honest service mail fraud, two counts of honest serves wire fraud, tow counts of extortion under color of official right and one count of of monetary transactions involving crime proceeds.