COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Ohio House Speaker Larry Householder and former state Republican Party Chair Matt Borges were convicted Thursday in a $60 million bribery scheme that federal prosecutors have called the largest corruption case in state history.
A jury in Cincinnati found the two guilty of conspiracy to participate in a racketeering enterprise involving bribery and money laundering. Each faces up to 20 years in prison.
The government’s prosecution team was able to show that “Householder sold the Statehouse” and betrayed the people he was elected to serve, and that Borges was “a willing co-conspirator,” U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio Kenneth Parker said in a statement.
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Prosecutors alleged that Householder, 63, orchestrated a scheme secretly funded by FirstEnergy Corp. to secure his power in the Legislature, elect his allies — and then to pass and defend legislation that delivered a $1 billion nuclear power plant bailout to the Akron-based electric utility. They alleged that Borges, then a lobbyist, sought to bribe Tyler Fehrman, an operative, for inside information on the referendum to overturn the bailout law.
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Article URL : https://apnews.com/article/larry-householder-corruption-verdict-bribery-trial-ohio-30763b21fc02e62464c20a77609a63ac