Former Va. delegate may be smarting about McDonnell sentence, but says hes at peace

RICHMOND — Former Republican state delegate Phillip A. Hamilton, who got a prison sentence far harsher than the one imposed on former governor Robert F. McDonnell this week, has advice for anyone following the trail he blazed from the Capitol to incarceration.

“Just take your negative circumstance and live it as positively as you can. And that’s about the best you can do,” Hamilton said in a phone interview from a minimum-security prison camp at Fort Dix, N.J. “And before you know it, hopefully your case manager will call you and say, ‘Hey, I need you to sign some paperwork and you’re going to be released in two weeks.’ ”

Hamilton, 62, who is serving a 91/2-year sentence for bribery and extortion, is likely to be awaiting that good news from his case manager far longer than McDonnell. Sentenced in August 2011, Hamilton has spent more time behind bars than McDonnell's entire two-year sentence. Hamilton's projected release date is June 27, 2019. McDonnell, who has been ordered to report to prison Feb. 9 but hopes to stay out pending appeals, could be out more than two years before that.

Hamilton gave an hour-long interview to The Washington Post in late December, ahead of McDonnell’s sentencing Tuesday in his federal corruption case. Federal prison officials prohibited any discussion of current or future inmates, including McDonnell, citing potential security risks.

But Hamilton was allowed to speak broadly about his own transition from powerful state political figure to federal prison inmate, a trajectory that McDonnell, a once-budding national GOP figure, now finds himself on.

In preparation for Robert McDonnell’s sentencing, here’s a look at sentences other politicians have faced in similar cases in recent years.

In a wide-ranging interview, Hamilton offered what in some ways could be a bleak preview for McDonnell. Like the former governor, Hamilton has insisted on his innocence and vowed to pursue every appeal. Those efforts have failed, most recently on the day of his interview.

Yet Hamilton, who does landscaping work, has remained decidedly upbeat. He enjoys the outdoor work and said his positive mind-set has been key to making his incarceration a productive and fulfilling time. He said he has become a better father to his two grown children, grown more appreciative of a handful of remaining friends and has nurtured relationships with two young grandchildren, one born after he was locked up. His Catholic faith has deepened. When the priest cannot be at the prison to preside over services, Hamilton steps up to share his own reflections on the readings.

“It’s a different lifestyle from what I had before,” he said. “I will tell you in a lot of ways — and this will sound a little strange — I am happier now than I was before. I am more at peace with myself both emotionally, spiritually. Again, I don’t want to be here. But there’s a lot I’m happy for.”

Once vice chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, the 21-year House of Delegates veteran was convicted of bribery and extortion in May 2011. A jury found that the Newport News Republican steered a $500,000 earmark to Old Dominion University, securing a $40,000-a-year position at the university in return.

He contends that he did nothing wrong and argues that he was the victim of an overzealous Justice Department bent on criminalizing politics. The office of the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, which prosecuted Hamilton, did not respond to a request for comment.

"I'm of the opinion that the federal government can target anyone whenever they want for almost whatever they want. The '1984' book by George Orwell is alive and well," he said. "This is a win-at-all-costs judicial system we have. ... I've served with people who said, 'I didn't do what they said, but they threatened to go after my wife.'"

Despite his belief that he was unfairly convicted, Hamilton said he has not allowed himself to be consumed by anger. He said he limits his time with fellow inmates who mope about their fates. During free time in the evenings, he chooses to retire early to his 200-man bunk room rather than hang out in a lounge area where inmates often dwell on the perceived injustices that landed them there.

Sentencing of Maureen McDonnell

Former first lady has been convicted of conspiring to sell the prestige of the governor’s office in exchange for loans.

“I’ve got some friends, some close people here, that are just miserable,” Hamilton said. “And I don’t like to maximize my time [with them] if all they’re going to do is sit around and be miserable. So I’ve tried to focus on the positive things. I didn’t get a life sentence and I didn’t get a death sentence. I am going to have a life to live when I get out of here. There’s 9

years of things I didn’t get to do, and there’s a little bit of sadness there. But look at all the things I’ve been able to do. That’s the joy and happiness side to it.”

Hamilton said he has become an avid reader, swapping books with fellow inmates and getting others from the prison library. He is big on mysteries and thrillers. A recent favorite was the World War II survival story “Unbroken.”

“I’ve probably done more reading in the last three years than I have in the first 59,” he said.

The positives that Hamilton sees to his incarceration could provide some solace to McDonnell, whose family has been ripped to shreds in a trial that pitted husband against wife, daughter against mother. McDonnell was tried and convicted alongside his wife, Maureen, who is to be sentenced in February.

Hamilton said his grown son and daughter travel to see him every other month, along with two grandchildren, ages 4 and 18 months. Hamilton and his second wife divorced after the trial, but his first wife, the mother of his two children, comes along on the visits, he said.

"I've grown to appreciate the people in my life much more than I did before," he said. "I think I'm a much better father than I was. ... The few friends that have stuck with me, I appreciate them much, much more than when I would see them every day or every week."

Hamilton counted McDonnell as a friend at one point. But then-governor McDonnell applauded the sentence imposed on Hamilton in August 2011.

“Today’s judgment is a reminder that no one is above the law,” McDonnell said in a statement released at the time.

At the time of Hamilton’s sentencing, McDonnell, his wife and children were already well on their way to accepting $177,000 in luxury gifts and sweetheart loans from a Richmond-area entrepreneur. McDonnell’s prosecutors invoked the former governor’s statement as they pushed for a stiff sentence. McDonnell had cheered Hamilton’s sentence at a time when he was “secretly in the thick of committing the same crimes,” prosecutors noted in a court filing urging a sentence of 10 years or more.

At McDonnell's sentencing hearing Tuesday, prosecutors also invoked several parallels between Hamilton's and McDonnell's cases.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Dry said that, if anything, McDonnell deserved a harsher penalty than the one Hamilton received. McDonnell’s misdeeds ran for about two years and Hamilton’s for less than one. Hamilton was one of many state lawmakers, while McDonnell was the governor. Also, Hamilton received a $40,000-a-year job that he was required to work, compared with McDonnell’s receipt of vacations, golf outings, a Ferrari ride, a Rolex watch and $120,000 in secret loans.

“These crimes,” Dry said of the McDonnell case, “are unprecedented in Virginia’s 226-year history.”

The Department of Corrections granted the interview with Hamilton on the condition that no questions be asked regarding the McDonnell case. Asked generally about people who had spoken in favor of his long sentence, Hamilton said: “There’s an old saying in life that what goes around comes around. And people who live in glass houses ought not to throw stones.”

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