“Mr. Kilpatrick’s release undermines the balance the court attempted to achieve at sentencing,” Edmunds said. “(Ferguson) was not an elected official and took no oath to serve the people of any constituency. He was a single-minded crony of the mayor’s, whose only apparent goal was to enrich himself at others’ expense.
“He achieved that goal through threats and intimidation, primarily focused on the business expectations of his targets,” the judge said. “But he was not the driver of the bus; that was Mr. Kilpatrick, where the power resided.”
Edmunds also noted that Ferguson has only 65% lung capacity and other health issues that could put him at risk for COVID-19 in prison.
Judge orders Kwame Kilpatrick crony Bobby Ferguson released from prison 10 years early
Bobby Ferguson
Bobby Ferguson, the Detroit contractor tied to former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick s corruption scandal, was ordered Thursday to be released from prison nearly a decade before the end of his sentence.
The order to free Ferguson from the Federal Correctional Institution, Elkton in Lisbon, Ohio, was made by Judge Nancy Edmunds of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan under the compassionate release provision. It comes about four months after then-President Donald Trump commuted the sentence of the disgraced former mayor.
Ferguson s family and supporters had been rallying for his release, arguing Ferguson shouldn t face a harsher punishment than his good friend Kilpatrick, who they say orchestrated the crimes. But prosecutors said he should remain in prison for ripping off the city with corrupt contracts.
Ex-Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s co-conspirator Bobby Ferguson granted ‘compassionate release’ from prison
Updated Apr 29, 2021;
Posted Apr 29, 2021
FILE - In this March 11, 2013, file photo, Bobby Ferguson, a friend of former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, leaves federal court after being found guilty, in Detroit. Ferguson, a Detroit contractor who got millions of dollars of city work through extortion will be released early from prison, a judge said Thursday, April 29, 2021, partly because a corrupt former mayor was granted an extraordinary break by President Donald Trump. It would be inequitable to keep Ferguson behind bars after Trump shortened the sentence of ex-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, his longtime partner in crime, U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds said. (David Coates/Detroit News via AP, File) APAP
by Violet Ikonomova Bobby Ferguson They were friends who received two of the longest sentences ever handed down for public corruption, but today Bobby Ferguson is a free man, three months after his co-defendant, former Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, was granted clemency by outgoing President Donald Trump. U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds opened the cell door for Ferguson on Thursday, after he served seven years of his 21-year sentence at a federal prison in eastern Ohio. Kilpatrick was sentenced to 28 years. It would be inequitable for the defendant to complete the lengthy sentence originally imposed while the more culpable co-defendant who had received an even lengthier sentence, has been released, Edmunds wrote in her release order.
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Detroit A federal judge Thursday freed contractor Bobby Ferguson from federal prison on compassionate grounds after he served only eight years of a 21-year sentence for helping former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick turn City Hall into a criminal enterprise.
The move by U.S. District Judge Nancy Edmunds shortens one of the longest sentences for public corruption in U.S. history and alters punishment for participating in a racketeering conspiracy that helped push Detroit to the brink of bankruptcy.
The order sends him home three months after Kilpatrick s conviction was commuted by President Donald Trump. Ferguson, 52, will still be required to pay $6,284,000 restitution to the Detroit Water & Sewerage Department.