HARRISBURG –Bonusgate defendent Brett Cott received a sentence of 21 to 60 months on three charges this morning.
He also received three fines totaling $11,000 and was told to make restitution to the state of $50,000. The sentence was imposed by Dauphin County Judge Richard Lewis, who rejected Mr. Cott’s defense attorny’s plea for probation. Mr. Cott was found guilty on three charges: conflict of interest, theft of services, and conspiracy.
The office of state Attorney General Tom Corbett had argued for a stiff sentence, claiming Mr. Cott had seriously misused taxpayer dollars in running as many as 20 political campaigns in Western Pennsylvania from 2004 to 2006.
Mr. Cott’s attorney, Bryan Walk, had claimed that the prosecution was political and said that Mr. Cott was aqcuitted on 39 of 42 charges brought against him. However Judge Lewis said that Mr. Cott’s offenses were serious and deserved time in state prison.
The judge said Mr. Cott spent most of his time that was paid for on taxpayer dollars “orchestrating and mastermining political activity.” The judge said “public money was used like monopoly money to run campaigns. Some potential candidates were scared off by this taxpayer funded juggernaut. The public was also victimized.”
He said probation was not an option because that “would demean the seriousness of the crimes.”
Deputy Attorney General Patrick Blessington said that Mr. Cott was paid salary of $223,000 plus bonuses of over $39,000 from 2004 to 2006 for basically running political campaigns. Mr. Cott is the first of the Bonusgate defendents to be sentenced.
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