Lawrence S. Goldman is a criminal defense lawyer based in New York City. He’s a contributing editor of the White Collar Crime Prof Blog Lawrence S. Goldman’s recent post on the White Collar Crime Prof Blog about Kevin Ring’s sentencing was outstanding.
Kevin Ring, as Goldman explained, was ‘the sole defendant to go to trial of the twenty indicted in the Abramoff lobbying scandal.’ Ring tried and failed (thirteen times) to reach a plea deal with the government. He claimed prosecutors pressured him to give false testimony against other defendants.
Finally he went to trial and after a hung jury was retried and convicted of conspiracy, honest services wire fraud, and paying an illegal gratuity by providing meals and sports and concert tickets for political favors. Last month he was sentenced to twenty month in prison.
Goldman said the case illustrates ‘the great pressure on potential cooperators to falsely implicate others in order to lessen their own sentences.’
How many FCPA defendants, we wonder, have already faced a similar choice?
‘It is an issue,’ Goldman said, ‘that has not had much exposure, primarily since white-collar defense lawyers who represent cooperators in their dealings with prosecutorial agencies (as almost every white-collar defense lawyer does) are hesitant personally or ethically to publicize it. It demands serious attention.’
_______________________
The post, ‘Kevin Ring Alleged Government Sought False Testimony,’ is here.
Comments are closed for this article!