JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – The former JEA CEO convicted on conspiracy charges in a scheme for a proposed bonus plan that prosecutors said could have paid out millions of dollars to Aaron Zahn and other executives, had the city-owned utility been sold, will spend four years behind bars.
Zahn was sentenced Tuesday after he was found guilty in March of attempting to defraud the city-owned utility.
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Zahn will voluntarily surrender to a facility designated by the Bureau of Prisons at a later date and will serve one year of supervised release when his sentence is over.
Zahn could have been sentenced to up to nine years in prison.
Defense attorneys took issue with the probation officer’s calculation of guidelines recommending a sentence of 7 years to 9 years of incarceration, which is largely based on an “intended loss” of $40 million. That is the amount the probation officer found that Zahn could have received from the performance unit plan, or PUP, had JEA been sold. They argued his sentencing guidelines should instead be calculated based on the actual loss of zero, and that even if the intended loss could be considered, the alleged loss is too speculative to factor into the sentencing.
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