Paul Manafort Sentenced to Four Years For a 20 Year Crime

Last week, Paul Manafort, former political consultant and campaign manager of Donald Trump, was sentenced to 47 months in prison for a multimillion-dollar fraud scheme. The sentencing comes after Robert Mueller conducted an investigation into Manafort’s collusion with the Russian government during Trump’s campaign. Recently, a federal judge added three and a half years to the sentencing. The sentencing has also brought up debate about criminal inequality in America.

The underwhelming four-year sentencing, which was decided by Judge T.S. Ellis, was met with shock across the country, drawing criticism, especially from legal experts. Legal guidelines recommend a prison term of at least 19 to 24 years, as is customary for similar crimes.

However, Ellis has blown off the outrage saying, “Go and spend a day in the jail or penitentiary of the federal government. Spend a week there. He has to spend 47 months.”

In a country where people of color are given life sentences for dealing marijuana, the privilege in this statement could not be more laughable. If you asked the millions of African American convicts serving more than four years for undeserving crimes, I would bet that each would gladly take Manafort’s sentencing.

The privilege in Ellis’ statement was quickly pointed out and picked apart by political figures bipartisanly. The statement also demonstrates how, arguably, Ellis may not even consider Manafort to have really done anything wrong, as he is clearly displaying sympathy for a white-collar criminal.

Judge Ellis’ sentencing may come from previous bias, it appears, as one of his prior cases has come out into the spotlight. In August, Ellis sentenced a Jamaican woman, Tessicar Jumpp, who conned people out of 385,000 dollars through a fake lottery scam, to serving 6 years in prison. Manafort, according to prosecutors, hid 55 million dollars in foreign accounts and conned three banks out of 25 million dollars. Yet, Ellis sentenced Manafort to only four years.

White collar crime is a world of its own, and giving criminals lower sentences simply because they have money and lack melanin in their skin is doing nothing to prevent it. This country’s grossly unequal prison system knows no bounds. Manafort’s ruling could not be perpetuating wealthy criminals any further.

By Annie Levy