The jury returned a guilty verdict on Thursday in the corruption trial of a suspended Los Angeles city councilman, Mark Ridley-Thomas.
Ridley-Thomas was convicted of federal bribery and conspiracy, as well as mail and wire fraud, arising from his tenure on the County Board of Supervisors.
Ridley-Thomas, 68, of South Los Angeles, faces federal charges of conspiracy and corruption, and multiple counts of honest services mail and wire fraud. If convicted of the charges, he faces years behind bars. He did not testify in his own defense.
Los Angeles City Councilman Mark Ridley Thomas, accused of corruption, was suspended from his duties on Wednesday.
Prosecutors alleged that the longtime local politician, while serving as county supervisor, ‘reached out’ and accepted USC benefits for the benefit of his son, Sebastian, the defense attacked just as strongly , suggesting to the jury that there was sufficient reasonable doubt to acquit .
Ridley-Thomas, the former chief executive of the SCLC, was suspended from the board last October, following his federal indictment on corruption charges.
Ridley-Thomas and Marilyn Flynna former dean of the USC School of Social Work, have been charged with 20 counts alleging a secret deal by which Ridley-Thomas, when a member of the county board of supervisors, agreed to direct the money county to college in exchange for admitting his son Sebastian Ridley-Thomas to graduate school on a full scholarship and a paid faculty position.
Flynn reportedly arranged to funnel a $100,000 donation of Ridley-Thomas campaign funds through the university to a nonprofit run by his son, a former Assemblyman. The donation sparked an investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles that remains open, prosecutors said.
In return, according to the indictment, Ridley-Thomas supported county contracts involving the School of Social Work, including for-profit agreements to provide services to the county’s Department of Children’s Services and to the family and county probation department, as well as an amendment to a contract with the Department of Mental Health that would bring the school millions of dollars in new revenue.
Both defendants had strongly denied wrongdoing and promised that the evidence would clear their names.
Flynn, 83, pleaded guilty last September to the charges against him.