Blagojevich To Appear For Resentencing Via Video Conference
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich will not be in the courtroom next month when a federal judge resentences him on 13 corruption convictions.
Instead, Blagojevich will appear via video conference from prison in Colorado. U.S. District Judge James Zagel approved the arrangement, after the U.S. Bureau of Prisons recommended the move, because transporting Blagojevich through the prison system from Colorado to Chicago would have taken up to two weeks.
Defense attorney Leonard Goodman said Blagojevich asked the warden at the prison for a furlough so he could make his own travel arrangements, but the warden refused.
A federal appeals court ordered the new sentencing hearing after it threw out five of his 18 corruption convictions last year.
Blagojevich has served more than four years of his original 14-year sentence, and his defense team is asking Zagel to reduce his sentence to five years, which would mean he would be released almost immediately.
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Federal prosecutors want the original sentence reinstated, arguing he has not truly accepted responsibility for his crimes, and does not deserve leniency.
Goodman argued that isn't true. He said the former governor deserves a reduced sentence.
"I think Rod Blagojevich is the only elected official in modern history that is incarcerated for exclusively campaign funding violations. He never put a penny in his pocket. He never took money from his campaign fund. He never took a cash bribe. He never took a Rolex watch, or a Ferrari," he said.
In a pre-sentence filing, Goodman submitted nearly 150 letters of support for Blagojevich, the vast majority of them written by his fellow inmates who call him "The Gov." The letters also describe how Blagojevich has spent his time behind bars, from teaching history to inmates to reading, running, and exercising at the gym.
"I've represented many people. I've never seen anything like this; the out pouring of devotion of other inmates," Goodman said.
Goodman also said Blagojevich has learned to play the guitar while in prison, and formed a prison band called the Jailhouse Rockers, an homage to his favorite musician, Elvis Presley.
While the appeals court tossed some of the charges connected to allegations Blagojevich tried to sell or trade an appointment to President Barack Obama's Senate seat, the ruling does not necessarily mean he will get a reduced sentence.
"It is not possible to call 168 months unlawfully high for Blagojevich's crimes," the three-judge panel wrote in its ruling last year.
Blagojevich's resentencing is scheduled for Aug. 9.
