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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.