Disgraced SCSU Scammer Gets Five Years

JONATHAN PINSON HEADED TO THE SLAMMER …

|| By FITSNEWS || On federal wiretaps, former S.C. State University board of trustees chairman Jonathan Pinson bragged about becoming the next U.S. Congressman from South Carolina.

Instead he’s headed (cue John Walsh) … “to jail.”

U.S. district court judge David Norton sentenced Pinson to five years in a federal prison this week for his role in various corrupt enterprises involving your tax dollars.

“I’m sure he is remorseful,” the judge said.  “The question is, remorseful for what? Remorseful for being caught on the tapes? Remorseful for being caught with his hand out?”

Last July, Pinson was found guilty on twenty-nine of forty-five charges filed against him by federal prosecutors.  Most of those charges stemmed from a bribery scandal involving S.C. State University (SCSU) – a chronically mismanaged Orangeburg, S.C. college that’s millions of dollars in debt.

That scandal also briefly ensnared Columbia, S.C. mayor Steve Benjamin, who along with Pinson was the beneficiary of a night of debauchery in Orlando, Florida in December 2010 – paid for by the developer at the heart of the SCSU bribery scam.

Pinson’s sentence – which was much lighter than the twelve years the government sought – was doled out nearly ten months after he was found guilty on 29 felony counts.  It also comes less than a week after an explosive national report linked U.S. Rep. Jim Clyburn to the scandal-scarred political appointee – and two months after Pinson’s acquitted co-defendant (and former college roommate) Eric Robinson was found dead in a hotel room in Atlanta, Georgia.

Have we heard the last of this scandal?

Let’s hope not …

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