Thursday, June 11, 2015

Sentencing set for ex-SCSU chief, trustee

ORANGEBURG, South Carolina -- The men who’ve admitted to being involved in the various schemes surrounding former South Carolina State University Chairman Jonathan Pinson will be sentenced next month.

In the meantime, Pinson has hired new attorneys and they’ve notified a federal court that they plan to appeal Pinson’s convictions and sentence.

A jury convicted Pinson last summer on 29 of 45 federal charges in schemes involving S.C. State’s 2011 homecoming, an effort to sell the 121-acre Sportsman’s Retreat to the university, a Marion County diaper factory and a Columbia-area housing complex called the Village at River’s Edge.

Pinson was sentenced on May 20 to serve five years in prison and five years of supervised release once he’s released. He also has to pay restitution in the amount of $337,843.

Co-conspirators in the various schemes previously pleaded guilty to charges and will be sentenced July 6 in Charleston at the Hollings Judicial Center with U.S. District Judge David Norton presiding.

The men connected to S.C. State who will be sentenced are:

• Florida developer Richard Zahn, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy to defraud the federal government. Zahn owned Sportsman’s Retreat in Orangeburg County. His hearing is scheduled for 11 a.m.

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