Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2024/04/22/no-prison-time-for-developer-who-bribed-city-officials-for-18-years.html
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Judge Illston should’ve just shrugged and said “It is what it is” and rubber stamped the judgment.
Utterly, fucking ridiculous. Is it wrong that I’m more angry at the judge than the defendant?
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So what happened to the city officials who took bribes over some or all of those eighteen years?
Ah, from the article:
The government’s reasoning for recommending the lesser sentence is due to Tahbazof’s cooperation in other cases. The developer came to the government before he was even on its radar, agreeing to aid it by wearing a wire and helping them build cases against several building inspection officials, Ward acknowledged.
The fact that the guy is 73 might have influenced the judge as well when it came to sentencing, not just his cooperation; a 15 year sentence (the potential maximum) could very well have been a life sentence.
It still seems pretty light, but it’s a little more understandable with that extra information.
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Yeah that does help explain it at least a bit given that if he hadn’t come forward on his own the likely outcome would have been “no punishment at all.”
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OK. But then fine the SOB. It should be at least double what he paid in bribes. If it was a just world it would be something like half the profits made over the last 18 years from those bribes. 
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Hmm. Is a fine punishment for bribery, or just a price increase?
Fine to be paid in cash, directly to the judge.
(But yeah, @Steve_L’s added context does make it make some sense)
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Why, that’s only a paltry 4166.67 a year!
I dunno, maybe the IRS will get him.
Probably facing less punishment than the bribee.
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No. That doesn’t work as much of a deterrent.
Twice the revenue of the projects that were approved as a result of the bribes.
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The tricky part is that there are two motives working at cross purposes here. They want to disincentivize crime, but they also want to incentivize criminals coming forward on their own to cooperate with authorities as this guy did.
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Seems like “bribery” potentially covers a lot of territory: anything from a system that normally works without corruption, except when someone weaponizes their wealth to break it and gain benefits they shouldn’t have (e.g. building permits for buildings that shouldn’t have gotten them), all the way to a systematically corrupt government where a “bribe” is just a mandatory fee, albeit one not mentioned in the regulations, money extorted from developers just to get anything done at all.
I wonder where in the continuum this case lay… sounds like multiple city inspectors were regularly taking money from developers, which suggests systematic corruption, but developers seem to have gained special benefits from it (beyond just being allowed to do business in a city infamous for red tape and delays). I wonder how many buildings were built that shouldn’t have been, or are unsafe because they let developers slide on failures to meet safety standards…
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