Pleading guilty to federal wire fraud charges. He will also be on probation for three year.
C&P Newswire
CLEVELAND — Former Cleveland City Councilman Basheer Jones has been sentenced to 28 months in prison after pleading guilty in federal court for his role in a $200,000 fraud and bribery scheme.
U.S. District Court Judge J. Philip Calabrese sentenced Jones to 28 months each for the charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and honest service wire fraud. Those sentences will run concurrently, as will the three years of probation for each count after Jones is released. According to its sentencing memorandum, prosecutors had recommended that Jones receive between 33 and 41 months in prison.
As a member of Cleveland City Council, Defendant held a position not only of prominence within the community, but also one of responsibility. However, instead of working for the benefit of his constituents, Defendant took advantage of his position to line his own pockets and the pockets of his family and associates,” prosecutors wrote in the memorandum. “A sentence within the Guidelines range would match Basheer Jones’s culpability and reflect the seriousness of his offenses.” In addition, Jones was ordered to pay back almost $144,000 to the two nonprofits that he defrauded. According to the Justice Department, Jones was charged last November via information on two counts involving conspiracy to commit wire fraud and honest services fraud. Prosecutors claim the 40-year-old lied to numerous nonprofits and deliberately hid facts to enter into deals that benefited both Jones and his unnamed co-conspirator, whom he was apparently in a romantic relationship with.
Jones was the subject of an FBI investigation related to his business dealings with nonprofits. Jones served for one term on city council in Ward 7 before electing to run for Mayor of Cleveland in 2021, finishing fifth out of seven candidates in the nonpartisan blanket primary. The charges stated Jones and “Coconspirator 1” ran their scheme between December of 2018 and June 2021, during which time Jones would advise nonprof-its to apply for funding or hire a “consultant” while not telling these organizations that the advisor was, in fact, his romantic partner. Jones was able to go home and get his affairs in order before turning himself in.
