LOS ANGELES (CN) — A federal choose on Tuesday sentenced former U.S. Congressman Jeff Fortenberry to 2 years probation following his conviction for concealing an unlawful marketing campaign contribution from a Parisian billionaire with whom he shared a ardour for the plight of Christian minorities within the Center East — and mendacity to the FBI about it.

U.S. District Choose Stanley Blumenfeld Jr. on Tuesday additionally ordered the Nebraska Republican to pay a $25,000 advantageous and to serve 320 hours of neighborhood service.

“The courtroom is satisfied that this wrongful alternative was out of character,” the choose stated in denying the federal government’s request to condemn Fortenberry to 6 months in jail. “By all accounts he’s a person of excellent character.”

Fortenberry’s legal professional, John Littrell, unsuccessfully pleaded with the choose to decrease the $25,000 advantageous, saying his consumer was not a person of nice means who stood to lose his federal pension whereas having 5 daughters to help. Fortenberry didn’t handle the choose himself.

A Los Angeles jury in February took lower than two hours to seek out Fortenberry, 61, responsible of concealing a $30,000 marketing campaign donation he had obtained not directly at a 2016 LA fundraiser from Gilbert Chagoury, a Nigerian-born businessman of Christian Lebanese descent who makes his residence in Paris. The jury additionally convicted Fortenberry of mendacity to the FBI after they confronted him concerning the donation after he had been advised by the host of the fundraiser the place the cash had come from.

“Defendant’s false statements and obstruction of justice aren’t victimless crimes,” prosecutors with the U.S. legal professional’s workplace in LA stated of their sentencing memo. “When a public official is revealed to have betrayed his oath, lied to federal investigators to guard his profession and picture, and endeavored to impede a major federal investigation into issues affecting the core of our democracy, the general public’s belief in its authorities is deeply affected.”

Fortenberry had represented Nebraska’s 1st Congressional District from 2005 by March this yr, when he resigned from Congress due to his conviction. He had come to know Chagoury by their mutual involvement with In Protection of Christians, a nonprofit that lobbied Congress on behalf of Christian teams and different non secular minorities within the Center East that confronted persecution.

The previous congressman obtained caught up within the FBI’s investigation of doable Federal Election Marketing campaign Act violations by Chagoury, who additionally had a home in Beverly Hills on the time and who investigators believed was secretly injecting overseas cash into U.S. election campaigns. Chagoury final yr paid $1.Eight million as a part of a deferred prosecution settlement with the Justice Division over $180,000 in unlawful contributions he made to 4 completely different campaigns.

The host of the 2016 fundraiser for Fortenberry, which concerned a gaggle Lebanese Christians dwelling within the LA space, testified on the trial that the FBI wasn’t even fascinated with Fortenberry after they first began questioning him however have been centered on different U.S. politicians to whom Chagoury might need given cash, together with 2012 presidential candidate Mitt Romney. After first mendacity to the FBI, the host, Dr. Elias Ayoub, was wracked by guilt and testified that he advised investigators concerning the different campaigns and about Fortenberry.

The investigation of Fortenberry didn’t achieve traction till 2018, when the congressman texted Ayoub that he needed to have a name with him. Ayoub knowledgeable the FBI and the company recorded the calls. Within the first name, Fortenberry requested about the potential of one other fundraiser in LA — a name for which the FBI solely requested the physician to listen to Fortenberry out.

Within the second name, nonetheless, Ayoub had been coached to place Fortenberry on discover that the majority of the donations on the 2016 fundraiser had been unlawful. On 4 events, he broached the topic with Fortenberry, telling him that they possible wouldn’t have the ability to elevate as a lot cash as earlier than as a result of $30,000 in money had come from an affiliate of Chagoury and doubtless from Chagoury himself.

Federal prosecutors say that after Fortenberry knew the donations have been unlawful, he neither disclosed this to the Federal Election Fee nor disgorged the cash as required by regulation. As a substitute, the federal government claims, he lied to investigators about what he been advised concerning the origin of the funds.

“The conviction on this case devastatingly impacted Mr. Fortenberry’s life,” his attorneys stated of their bid to maintain him out of jail. “As soon as a revered public servant, Mr. Fortenberry resigned from Congress. Stripped of the rights to vote and possess a firearm, Mr. Fortenberry can not even take part in our democracy. The federal pension that he relied on for retirement is now in jeopardy.”