Jan

22

New Sentencing Hearing Scheduled for Professor Roth

Posted by at 6:27 pm on January 22, 2014
Category: General
Professor John Roth
ABOVE: Professor Reece Roth

John Reece Roth, a former professor at the University of Tennessee who was convicted of violating U.S. export laws for, among other things, transferring technical data relating to drones to foreign graduate students, is getting another sentencing hearing. Currently serving a four year sentence in a federal penitentiary, Mr. Roth can thank Jeffrey Skilling of Enron infamy, for his new sentencing hearing.

In addition to the export law violations, Roth was also convicted under the “honest services” provision of 18 U.S.C. § 1346. That provision was subsequently interpreted by the U.S. Supreme Court on appeal by Skilling of his conviction under that statute to apply only in cases in which a bribe or kickback had been paid, something which both the government and Roth’s counsel agree did not occur in his case. The issue at the hearing will be whether his conviction on the remaining 16 counts will be enough to justify his four-year sentence. You can, of course, guess which side of this argument each side is on. The hearing is scheduled for February 24, 2014

The only news story on the resentencing hearing is in the Knoxville News Sentinel. No link to that story is provided because, unbelievably, every single word of that newspaper is behind a paywall. The idea that the News Sentinel should charge for all of its content (unlike, say, the New York Times which provides a limited number of articles free to each reader per month) is particularly ironic when you consider that the reporter said this about the original Roth trial

His trial served as a test case nationwide for whether information itself can be a “defense article” subject to export control. Traditionally, export control violations have involved actual equipment or devices.

Er, no. Obviously the reporter neither reads this blog or knows how to work the Google or she might have stumbled on the Chi Mak trial which preceded Roth’s and where the defendant was convicted for exporting technical data about submarine engines to China.

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Copyright © 2014 Clif Burns. All Rights Reserved.
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3 Comments:

The trial of Bernie Madoff served as a test case nationwide for whether a vast Ponzi scheme using wire and mail fraud is punishable under federal statutes that have been around for decades. Traditionally, stealing money has involved guys with horses, masks, and revolvers that went “kapow! kapow!”

Comment by Pat on January 23rd, 2014 @ 10:20 am

Being the only person that took any personal responsibility in the Roth case, as well as the individual that told first told Roth he couldn’t utilize his Iranian student, and also as former employee and co-founder of Atmospheric Glow Technologies, Inc. (AGT), I’m aware of a
couple of little known Enron parallels related to both Roth, the former AGT, and even myself.

First, the University of Tennessee shredded all the remaining papers and books left in Roth’s UT office, which is the same course of action taken by Enron’s accounting firm, Arthur Andersen. Secondly, most of the office furniture located in the former AGT offices, including the massive board room conference table, was purchased via internet auction from the former Chicago headquarters of the very same company, Arthur Anderson. Lastly, I served my time in the same prison facility as Enron’s former CFO, Andy Fastow. Sadly, the parallels end there, nobody in management at either University of Tennessee or AGT were ever held accountable for the contracting failures that occurred.

Comment by Daniel Max Sherman on January 23rd, 2014 @ 11:01 am

Mr. Sherman, it’s always a pleasure to read your take on things. Thank you.

Comment by Chris W on January 24th, 2014 @ 2:17 pm