Former DeKalb County Commissioner Sharon Barnes Sutton has been found guilty of extorting a county vendor.
The verdict was handed down Wednesday afternoon, eight days after the start of her trial in U.S. District Court in Atlanta began and a little over 24 hours after the jury hearing the case began deliberating. A press release said Barnes Sutton was convicted on two counts of extortion; she was acquitted on a separate charge of bribery.
The ex-commissioner, who left office in 2016, is scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 6.
She faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison, though a former federal prosecutor previously told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that guidelines would likely recommend a sentence of less than four years.
Barnes Sutton was accused of soliciting bribes from a county contractor in 2014. During the trial, prosecutors presented evidence that they say showed the former commissioner demanding Reginald Veasley pay her $500 a month.
Veasley was a subcontractor on a multimillion contract tied to work on DeKalb County’s Snapfinger Creek Advanced Wastewater Treatment Plant. Barnes Sutton allegedly extorted Veasley because she was upset another vendor — Veasley’s former employer — was not included on the project.
With help from Morris Williams, a county staffer who was wearing a wire after being flipped by the FBI, Veasley ultimately paid Barnes Sutton a total of $1,000. The FBI “disrupted” her demands in Aug. 2014.
“This was a shakedown, plain and simple,” prosecutor Victor Salgado said during his closing argument earlier this week.
Barnes Sutton’s defense team contended at trial that the payments were not bribes but contributions to an “informal legal defense fund.” At the time, authorities were already investigating allegations involving the commissioner misusing a county purchasing card.
Though Barnes Sutton was not charged until 2019, her actions came during a period of DeKalb County governance defined by corruption and backroom deals. Several officials and county employees from the same era were implicated by a special grand jury, faced criminal charges or both.
The Barnes Sutton case — possibly the final legal shoe to drop from that period in the early- to mid-2010s — was originally scheduled to go to trial in 2020. It was delayed several times thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic and a variety of other issues.
Natasha Silas, one of Barnes Sutton’s attorneys, did not immediately respond to requests for comment Wednesday evening.
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