By Jasper Ward
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -A former Tennessee legislator was sentenced to three years in prison after he was convicted on an array of corruption charges, the U.S. Department of Justice said on Tuesday.
The department said Glen Casada, 66, a Republican former speaker of Tennessee’s House of Representatives, had been convicted of honest services wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, using a fictitious name to carry out a fraud, and money laundering.
His former chief of staff, Cade Cothren, 38, was sentenced last week to 30 months in prison on the same charges, the department said.
Casada was also ordered to pay a $30,000 fine and to forfeit $4,643.60 in proceeds, while Cothren was ordered to pay a $25,000 fine, according to the department.
Matthew R. Galeotti, the acting assistant attorney general in the department’s criminal division, said Casada and Cothren abused their power and defrauded taxpayers to enrich themselves.
“Tennesseans have a right to expect honest services from their elected leaders and their staffs,” Robert E. McGuire, the acting U.S. attorney for the Middle District of Tennessee, said in a statement.
The Casada case is one of several that have been previously scrutinized by Justice Department leadership over whether it represented what it sees as a “weaponization” against President Donald Trump’s supporters, although the investigation began during Trump’s first term in office.
(Reporting by Jasper Ward in WashingtonEditing by Matthew Lewis)
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