EXCLUSIVE: Feds recommend probation for 2 co-conspirators in S.C. State corruption case

Federal prosecutors in the Jonathan Pinson public corruption case involving S.C. State University are recommending that two key co-conspirators who testified against Pinson get probation and avoid prison.

Florida developer Richard Zahn and former S.C. State University police chief Michael Bartley gave the government “substantial assistance” in providing information about Pinson’s crimes, then testified against him in last year’s trial, according to prosecutors’ motions filed Tuesday.

Instead of prison, Zahn and Bartley should get probationary sentences of 8-14 months that they would serve on home detention, prosecutors recommended.

Federal Judge David Norton, who presided over Pinson’s federal trial last summer in Columbia, is scheduled to sentence Zahn and Bartley Monday in Charleston. Prosecutors have described Pinson as “the mastermind” of four separate criminal conspiracies, two of which involved the university.

Pinson was sentenced to five years in prison in May.

At Pinson’s trial, prosecutors played FBI wiretaps of Zahn and Pinson discussing a new $90,000 Porsche Cayenne that Zahn was going to give Pinson as a kickback for helping Zahn sell a 121-acre property called Sportsman’s Retreat to S.C. State University. At the time, Zahn was trying to sell the property to the university for $3 million.

“Based in part on Zahn’s testimony, Pinson was convicted” of racketeering and wire fraud in connection with the effort to get the university to spend public money to buy Zahn’s property, the motions said.

Bartley’s cooperation also was consequential, prosecutors said. Bartley, once confronted, admitted he had agreed to help Zahn unload the Sportsman’s Retreat property to the university, in return for 1 percent of the purchase price, according to documents filed Tuesday. Zahn was also to buy Bartley a four-wheeler, the motions said.

Bartley “also provided additional details concerning a trip to Florida during which Bartley introduced Pinson to Zahn. This meeting initiated a business relationship that would eventually lead to Pinson’s pushing various members of the board of trustees at S.C. State University and other faculty and staff to purchase the Sportsman’s Retreat property,” the motions said.

In testifying at the trial about the trip to Florida, Bartley told the jury that Columbia Mayor Steve Benjamin also went on the trip and went to a strip club with Benjamin and Zahn. Benjamin, a longtime Pinson friend and business associate, was not charged with any crime in connection with the case.

Zahn pleaded guilty earlier to attempted bribery of an official of an organization receiving more than $10,000 in federal funds. Bartley pleaded guilty to mail fraud and conspiring to accept an illegal payoff. The maximum prison sentences for both men are five years.

Norton has ordered Pinson to report to prison by Aug. 31. However, Pinson’s attorneys have moved to allow Pinson to stay free on bond and not report to prison until a pending appeal to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals has been exhausted.

This story was originally published June 29, 2015 at 7:20 PM.