HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Former Connecticut Gov. John Rowland, serving a 30-month prison sentence for campaign fraud, will be released nearly a year early from a federal minimum-security camp in Pennsylvania, a spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons said.
HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Former Connecticut Gov. John Rowland, serving a 30-month prison sentence for campaign fraud, will be released nearly a year early from a federal minimum-security camp in Pennsylvania, a spokesman for the U.S. Bureau of Prisons said.
The 60-year-old Republican, who also was convicted in a corruption scandal that forced him to resign the governorship in 2004, is scheduled to be released from the Lewisburg penitentiary camp 11 months early, on May 27, 2018.
It’s not clear, however, why Rowland will be released early. Bureau of Prisons spokesman Justin Long told Hearst Connecticut Media on Monday that he could not comment on the specifics of the early release because of privacy laws.
Andrew Fish, a lawyer for Rowland, did not return messages from The Associated Press on Tuesday.
Federal inmates can get time off their sentences for good conduct — up to 54 days for each year served. They also can get a year off their sentences for completing a drug abuse treatment program, or win early release due to health problems or clemency.
Most federal inmates also must serve the last six months of their sentences in halfway houses.
A federal jury convicted Rowland in 2014 of plotting to hide political consulting roles through sham contracts in the failed Connecticut 5th District congressional campaigns of Lisa Wilson-Foley in 2012 and Mark Greenberg in 2010.
Rowland was governor from 1995 to 2004, when he resigned amid a corruption scandal that would send him to prison for 10 months.
Federal prosecutors said he took more than $100,000 worth of illegal gifts while in office, including private flights to Las Vegas, Vermont vacations and a free hot tub and repairs at his Connecticut cottage.
