The misdemeanor guilty plea of John Campos, the former head of a bank with Black Friday ties, has been accepted by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. Judge Lewis Kaplan, presiding over the matter, received a great deal of input from federal prosecutors before allowing the plea to be entered.
This news comes almost a month after Campos had first announced his plea. Judge Kaplan was initially skeptical of this action, in light of the five felony charges hanging over the former banker’s head. But, according to iGaming Business, advice from several United States Attorneys in his district (including Preet Bharara, Arlo Devlin-Brown and Andrew Goldstein) swayed the matter in favor of the defendant. A letter penned by this legal trio provided the key arguments, showing that Campos’ role, in comparison to that over the other Black Friday indictees, was fairly minor.
The deeds in question came during his time as the chairman of SunFirst Bank. Prior to the bank’s shutdown in early 2011, the institution hemorrhaged some $2,700,000 of their customers’ money. Also involved in the process was Chad Elie, another Black Friday indictee, who collaborated with Campos in processing illegal online gambling transactions. Elie allegedly agreed to invest some $10,000,000 into the deal, which would have acquired him a 30% interest in SunFirst Bank.
Now, it appears as though Campos will face a maximum of six months in prison. This represents a significant reduction from the potential sentence which five felonies would have generated. However, he will also be barred from the banking industry, putting him out of work for the foreseeable future. The exact terms of his sentence will be decided when he faces Judge Kaplan late this coming June.