Former federal agent who aided organized-crime figure is sentenced to 10 years in prison
William P. Campbell, a former federal agent who assisted an organized-crime figure in the 1970s, and was involved in a failed campaign to assassinate New Jersey Sen. Thomas Kean, was sentenced to 10 years in prison today.
He was convicted of participating in a conspiracy to distribute drugs, conspiring to defraud the United States, receiving firearms and silencers and lying to federal investigators.
Campbell was also ordered to pay $2.5 million in restitution to his former employer, the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. He has been out of prison for four years since his conviction.
Campbell’s convictions in a separate criminal case in New Jersey were overturned after he lost a civil case in 2003, because the federal statute of limitations had expired.
The 10-year sentence for the federal conspiracy, obstruction of justice and firearm charges is seven years longer than a federal sentencing guideline would have allowed.
But Campbell, wearing a white prison jumpsuit, smiled and thanked the judge before the sentence was imposed.
A federal jury had rejected the charges against him, finding him guilty of conspiring to distribute cocaine and marijuana, conspiring to defraud the U.S., and receiving firearms and silencers and lying to federal investigators.
After sentencing, his attorney, Robert Stegman, said the government had the choice to plea bargain for a lighter sentence. But they instead decided to try Campbell for multiple federal charges, including conspiring to defraud the United States and defrauding the U.S. government.
But Stegman said, “The sentencing judge was concerned about the impact of the loss of the civil suit of $700,000 on the defendant. But if the government takes something like that on conviction, it can be the death sentence if the government fails to prove its case.”
Campbell was also ordered to forfeit the assets from his former agency and pay a fine of $10,000.
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms investigators had investigated Campbell, who joined the agency in 1966, after learning that he was a convicted felon at age 30. Three years later, they