[btilly]

That is a good article.

Ironically I've eaten at that restaurant. It was quite good before it was shut down. (No, I never had the whale sushi.)

[tptacek]

It bugged me that I didn't have a better answer, so I tracked down the applicable 2012 sentencing guidelines:

https://www.justia.com/criminal/docs/sentencing-guidelines/s...

... and in the interpretation most generous to the DoJ I came up with a sentencing grade of 27, which works out to 7 years for a first-time offender.

I think if you read through the guidelines (they're interesting!) you'll see right away that there was no way he could have gotten 35 years. I stand by "the DOJ lied about the sentence in the press release".