SC judge tells ex-SCANA CEO his nuclear crime is ‘much larger than’ his guilty plea

A South Carolina circuit court judge Monday sentenced SCANA’s former CEO to two years in prison, but not before lecturing him on how his crimes of betrayal of trust against taxpayers and ratepayers likely merited a greater punishment.

Although Kevin Marsh pleaded guilty to a simple-sounding crime — obtaining a signature or goods by false pretense over $10,000— Judge Mark Hayes told the former Fortune 500 top executive that the half-dozen reporters from across the state in court Monday were ample proof of the enormity of the havoc wreaked by his crime.

“The eyes that are in this courtroom today looks at this as something so much larger than just a state prosecution of ‘obtaining signature ... by false pretenses,’” Hayes told Marsh. “It’s much larger.”

As CEO of the now-defunct SCANA, Marsh, 66, presided over a cover-up of massive cost overruns and construction failings at the V.C. Summer nuclear facility in Fairfield County. There, SCANA and state-owned Santee Cooper were trying to build a $10 billion project of two nuclear reactors to produce electricity.

The troubles at the project led to both company’s unexpected abandonment in July 2017, leaving more than 3,000 construction workers without jobs. SCANA, once one of South Carolina’s most successful and dominant businesses, also collapsed.

In early 2019, SCANA was bought by Dominion Energy.

Last week, Marsh was sentenced to two years in federal prison by U.S. Judge Mary Lewis for his role at the failed nuclear plant. He could have gotten five years in prison for conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud.

After Marsh’s hearing Monday, state Attorney General Alan Wilson told reporters the investigation into SCANA is continuing and added that “the CEO of a Fortune 500 company is going to prison and paying a $5 million fine. It doesn’t happen that often.”

On Monday, Hayes, appointed by the S.C. Supreme Court to handle the state’s SCANA case, gave Marsh a 10-year prison sentence. However, he agreed to lower the sentence to two years because of a negotiated plea arrangement with state and federal prosecutors and Marsh’s defense lawyers.

Marsh will be allowed to serve his state sentence simultaneously as the federal sentence he received last week. He also will be allowed to serve his two years in the federal prison system, widely perceived to be safer and have better medical facilities.

He’s expected to start his sentence in December at the federal prison in Butner, North Carolina.

In return for his shorter sentence, the judge reminded Marsh that he must continue to provide truthful information in any continuing SCANA investigation or face more criminal charges. Marsh’s federal sentence was the result of his “substantial” help, which helped lead to the guilty pleas by former SCANA official Stephen Byrne and former Westinghouse official Carl Churchman.

Neither has been sentenced.

“Your obligation to this court and the state of South Carolina will continue,” Hayes said.

Marsh’s actions, which led to his deliberate cover-up of failures at the nuclear plant, were not at first intentional falsehoods but escalated slowly, said top S.C. Attorney General prosecutor Creighton Waters, who oversees the state grand jury that indicted Marsh.

“Like a frog in boiling water,” Waters described.

“This case is not Bernie Madoff,” Waters continued Monday, referring to the late swindler, whose Ponzi schemes bilked billions of dollars from investors. Marsh’s cover-up did enable him to look good at his job and continue to be highly paid, Waters said.

SCANA’s downfall began long ago, when the Legislature allowed SCANA to put extra charges on ratepayers’ bills for the ongoing construction costs at the project, Waters said.

That decision, which allowed SCANA to take on a project that would be paid for even if it failed, created “a lack of consequence” for company leaders that, along with their “hubris,” led to crimes being committed, Waters said.

Earlier this year, Marsh paid $5 million to the government, representing “disgorgement of ill-gotten gains and compensation he would not have earned had he come clear about the true nature of his project,” Waters said.

He added that money “came out of his own pocket and was not any sort of funny money from the company.”

The money will go to the state Office of Economic Opportunity and be used to help low-income utility ratepayers, Waters said.

At Marsh’s 38-minute hearing Monday, his lawyer, Robert Bolchoz of Columbia, likened Marsh to a captain of “a ship that runs aground ... due to intentional wrong-doing of crew members on the ship.”

“People intentionally misled him. There were times he was lied to,” Bolchoz said. “It took a lot of folks being dishonest to put us all in this courtroom right now.”

Marsh told the judge, ”I will always be personally and professionally disappointed over the failure of the project. Nevertheless, I accept full responsibility for my actions. I am truly sorry for everything that has occurred.”

Waters told the judge blame for SCANA’s failures rightly falls on Marsh.

“With great power comes great responsibility,” Waters said, quoting Spiderman.

This story was originally published October 11, 2021 at 3:03 PM.