US: Ex-Redflex CEO gets 30 months for aiding red-light camera bribery

So moments later, US District Judge Virginia Kendall sentenced the one-time CEO of Redflex Traffic Systems to 30 months in prison for enabling a massive bribery scheme at the heart of Chicago’s red-light camera program.

Karen Finley, 57, pleaded guilty in August 2015 to conspiracy to commit federal program bribery. US Attorney Zachary Fardon said Finley played a “vital and active role” in a scam that netted City Hall insider John Bills 10 years in prison earlier this year.

“I’m sorry that my conduct has contributed to the public’s mistrust of the government,” Finley told the judge moments before she was sentenced.

A judge in Ohio handed Finley a 14-month prison sentence last month for her role in a similar scheme there. She will serve the two sentences simultaneously, and her attorneys had hoped her Chicago sentence would not exceed the one handed down in Ohio.

But prosecutors here asked Kendall to sentence Finley to 30 months in prison, calling bribery a “two-way street.”

“Corrupt public officials cannot rob taxpayers without private counterparts willing to feed their corruption,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Laurie Barsella wrote in a sentencing memo late last month. “Finley was a senior executive of a company that chose to compete for business in Chicago. Rather than competing fairly, Finley and others at Redflex chose to play dirty.”

Full Content: Chicago Sun-Times

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