CHICAGO, June 11 (UPI) -- A former public defender in Chicago was sentenced to three years in prison for smuggling thousands of Cuban cigars into the United States.
Richard Connors, 55, was convicted in October 2002 on eight counts of smuggling, conspiracy and violating the Trading with the Enemy Act, which bars Americans from purchasing Cuban products.
Connors smuggled thousands of Cuban cigars over the course of dozens of trips to Cuba between 1996 and 1999, covering up his actions by lying to customs officials and mailing his passport home from Canada or Mexico on his way back to Chicago from Cuba, The Chicago Tribune reported. He then sold the cigars for as much as $350 a box.
U.S. District Judge Ronald Guzman Wednesday called Connors' activities "a complex and intricate plan of many steps over a lengthy period of time" and sentenced him to 37 months in prison plus three years of probation and fined him $60,000.
