The Los Angeles Times reports that suspended Democratic state Sen. Roderick D. Wright may spend six months in jail, if Los Angeles County Deputy District Attorney Bjorn Dodd has his way.
Dodd requested the Los Angeles County Superior Court not only to issue a six-month sentence, but also five years’ probation and 1,000 hours of community service for Wright. If the judge rejects jail time, Dodd wants Wright to be sentenced to six months of home confinement to accompany the community service.
In January, Wright was convicted of eight felony counts, among them fraudulent voting and perjury; Wright had lied and said he lived in the district which he represented. He claimed he had satisfied requirements to establish the Inglewood apartment complex he owned as his “domicile.” Prosecutors said that Wright had duplicitously claimed his apartment complex as his residence while his true residence was in Baldwin Hills.
Dodd wrote the court, “He lied and set up a pretense to skirt the basic requirements for qualifications to vote and run for public office as a matter of convenience for himself… he has continuously demonstrated a lack of concern for his actions.”
Wright is supposed to be sentenced on September 3, at which point he is expected to ask for a new trial; prosecutors have filed documents with the court to rebuff Wright’s request. They are also planning to ask Judge Kathleen Kennedy to instruct Wright he is ineligible for public office in the future.
Wright is still being paid; his March suspension still allowed him compensation. He was not expelled from the state Senate because such an expulsion demands a two-thirds vote of his or her respective house. He was indicted by a county grand jury in September 2010, and the possible sentence he may incur can range up to eight years and four months.
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