Mark Ridley-Thomas sentenced to three years, six months in prison

A judge sentenced former Los Angeles City Councilmember Mark Ridley-Thomas to three years and six months’ imprisonment, a $30,700 fine and three years of supervised release on Monday for seven felony corruption charges including bribery, conspiracy, mail fraud and wire fraud. The sentencing follows Ridley-Thomas’ conviction in March.

The charges stem from a bribery scheme between Ridley-Thomas and Marilyn Flynn, former dean of the Dworak-Peck School of Social Work. In the scheme, Ridley-Thomas secured admission and a full-tuition scholarship to the graduate social work program and a part-time professor position for his son, Sebastian Ridley-Thomas. He also funneled $100,000 through Dworak-Peck into a nonprofit run by the younger Ridley-Thomas, who at the time in December 2017 was facing a sexual harassment investigation as a member of the state assembly. In exchange for these favors, Ridley-Thomas supported a lucrative contract in city council that benefitted Dworak-Peck. 

In the sentencing hearing, Judge Dale S. Fischer said “the entire community has been victimized” by Ridley-Thomas’ actions, and “there is simply no justification for monetizing a public office.” Ridley-Thomas stated prior to his sentencing that the perception that his exchange was criminal was “distressing” and “harmful,” though he acknowledged that his actions were “ill-advised.”

“It’s so common for people to kind of wink and nod, and you do things for your friends, but it’s hard to prove that that’s actually illegal,” said Rebecca Lonergan, an associate professor of law in the Gould School of Law. “Because that is a slippery slope, a lot of times local political corruption doesn’t get very long sentences.” 

Ridley-Thomas’ defense team filed a memo Aug. 7, the same day the prosecution recommended a sentence of six years’ imprisonment, requesting that the judge pursue home confinement, which was granted to Flynn in July after she entered a plea deal. The request was not granted.

Lonergan said the difference in sentences could be attributed to a variety of factors: Flynn entered a plea agreement while the defense for Ridley-Thomas has denied wrongdoing; also, public officials are often given heavier sentences than regular citizens because of their violation of their oath of office. 

Furthermore, the sentencing documents calculated the monetary value of Ridley-Thomas’ crimes to be greater than Flynn’s. In Flynn’s case, the judge only accounted for the $100,000 funneled through Dworak-Peck into the younger Ridley-Scott’s nonprofit, while Ridley-Thomas is being prosecuted for the value of the contract he supported in exchange for the funds, valued at more than half a million dollars. 

Ultimately, the judge chose an intermediate sentencing path between the prosecution’s recommendation and that of the defense, something Lonergan said is common when there is a significant gap between the two.

The sentencing of Ridley-Thomas represents another mark on the reputation of both USC and the L.A. City Council, though for students like Ryan King, a junior majoring in business administration and finance, the situation has had little effect on their opinions of the University.

“Because [of] the reputation that [USC has], I think the entire rumblings around these scandals are just a lot more exacerbated,” King said. “Not to say that they aren’t significant, but in terms of how it impacts me personally as a student, I haven’t really seen any evidence of that, so I don’t give a lot of thought to it.”

In spite of the trial, community members appear willing to give Ridley-Thomas “the benefit of the doubt” because of his long history of service to the community in local government, said Ruben Davila, a professor of clinical accounting who was born and raised in L.A.

“Unlike some politicians he is visible, he is available, people see him shopping in the community, he’s accessible, and the big thing is, he’s made a difference,” Davila said.

Ridley-Thomas contributed to the reopening of the King/Drew Medical Center in July 2015, now called the Martin Luther King, Jr. Outpatient Center, in South Central L.A. after it shut down in 2007 because of a lack of funding. He also helped launch the Empowerment Congress in 1998, which aimed to help South Central community members organize and advocate for themselves.  

To Davila, however, the trial was “troubling.” Davila sat on the executive board of the faculty senate between 2014 and 2017, when news broke about several scandals relating to the University. In March 2016, former Keck School of Medicine Dean Carmen Puliafito stepped down amid an L.A. Times investigation that eventually revealed his history of partying with illicit drugs. In June 2017, former USC gynecologist George Tyndall resigned as his history of sexually abusing patients crystallized.

Amid the aforementioned scandals, hundreds of professors called on former University President C.L. Max Nikias to resign, which he did in Aug. 2018.

“USC has a responsibility to the community, and to everybody who’s gone to university, the alumni, to uphold our reputation,” Davila said. “It bothered me, the things that happened before that happened again.”