Former state Sen. Leland Yee pleads guilty in corruption case
Source: SF Chronicle
Former state Sen. Leland Yee faces years in federal prison after admitting Wednesday that he took bribes from undercover FBI agents in exchange for promises to vote on legislation, arrange meetings for his purported donors, and illegally smuggle guns from the Philippines.
The longtime public official — who only last year was a candidate for California secretary of state — pleaded guilty to a felony charge of using that short-lived campaign as a “racketeering enterprise” to solicit funds from agents who posed as contributors.
In his plea agreement, filed in federal court in San Francisco, Yee, 67, said he had agreed to “conduct ... the affairs of the campaign through a pattern of racketeering activity.” He said his transactions with the agents took place between October 2012 and March 2014 and netted him $34,600.
The charge is punishable by up to 20 years in prison and a $250,000 fine. Yee’s plea agreement did not recommend a specific sentence. But a plea agreement signed by his former consultant and fundraiser, Keith Jackson, who admitted to the same charge, called for a prison term of between six and 10 years. Jackson, 50, is a former San Francisco school board president.
Read more: http://www.sfchronicle.com/crime/article/Former-Sen-Leland-Yee-changes-plea-to-guilty-in-6360935.php?t=4fd88aa3781210a92f
= new reply since forum marked as read
