A South Georgia district attorney has been sentenced to an 18-month prison term for lying to federal agents about an improper sexual relationship with a confidential informant.
On Wednesday, U.S. District Court Judge Hugh Lawson sentenced Robert B. Ellis Jr., formerly district attorney of the Alapaha Judicial Circuit, to 18 months in prison and levied a $5,000 fine against him for making a false statement to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
F. Maxwell Wood, the U.S. attorney for Georgia's Middle District who prosecuted Ellis, said that the judge had departed upward from federal sentencing guidelines in sentencing the former DA. Lawson did so based on the impact that Ellis' indictment and guilty plea had on the community, according to Wood.
Details here from the Fulton County Daily Report via Law.com.