Fugees rapper Pras sentenced to 14 years in prison over illegal donations to Obama campaign | Fugees
Fugees’ Grammy-winning rapper Prakazrel “Pras” Michel was sentenced to 14 years in prison in a case in which he was found guilty of illegally funneling millions of dollars in foreign contributions to former US president Barack Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign.
Michel, 52, refused to speak in court before U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly sentenced him on Thursday.
In April 2023, a federal jury found Michel guilty of 10 counts, including conspiracy and being an unregistered agent of a foreign government. The hearing in Washington DC included testimony from actor Leonardo DiCaprio and former attorney general Jeff Sessions.
Justice department prosecutors said federal sentencing guidelines recommend a life sentence for Michel, who they said “betrayed his country for money” and “lied unrepentantly and relentlessly to further his own plans.”
“His sentence must reflect the breadth and depth of his crimes, his indifference to the risks facing his country, and the magnitude of his greed,” they wrote.
Defense lawyer Peter Zeidenberg said his client’s 14-year sentence was “completely disproportionate to the crime.” According to his lawyer, Michel will appeal his conviction and sentence.
Zeidenberg recommended a three-year prison sentence. Michel’s lawyers said in a court filing that a life sentence would be an “absurdly high” sentence for Michel, as it is usually reserved for deadly terrorists and drug cartel leaders.
“The government’s attitude is one that would have caused Inspector Javert to stand down, and it clearly demonstrates how easily the Guidelines can be manipulated to produce absurd results and how ill-equipped they are, at least in this case, to determine a fair and just sentence,” they wrote.
A Brooklyn native whose parents immigrated to the United States from Haiti, Michel was a founding member of the Fugees, along with childhood friends Lauryn Hill and Wyclef Jean. Hip-hop groups have won two Grammy awards and sold tens of millions of albums.
Michel obtained more than $120 million from Malaysian billionaire Low Taek Jho, also known as Jho Low, and directed some of that money to Obama’s campaign through straw donors.
Prosecutors said Michel also tried to shut down the justice department investigation of Low, tampered with two witnesses and lied at trial.
Low, who lives in China, was one of the main financiers of the movie The Wolf of Wall Street, starring DiCaprio. Low is a fugitive but has maintained his innocence.
“Low’s motivation for giving Mr. Michel money to donate was not so that he could achieve some political goal. Instead, Low simply wanted to take a photo with himself and then-President Obama,” Michel’s lawyers wrote.
In August 2024, the judge denied Michel’s request for a new trial, based in part on his defense attorney’s use of a generative artificial intelligence program in closing the trial’s arguments. The judges said this and other errors in judgment did not amount to a serious miscarriage of justice.
