Former Atlanta city official gets 2 years in bribery probe

ATLANTA — A former high-ranking Atlanta city official was sentenced Tuesday to serve more than two years in federal prison for accepting bribes in exchange for lucrative city contracts.

U.S. District Judge Steve Jones ordered former chief procurement officer Adam Smith to serve two years and three months in prison followed by three years of supervised release. Smith was also ordered to pay $44,000 restitution and a $25,000 fine.

Smith was charged as part of an ongoing federal investigation into corruption at City Hall. He’s the fourth person and only former city official to have been charged so far as part of the investigation.

Federal guidelines called for a sentence ranging from nearly four years to nearly five years. But federal prosecutors, citing “substantial assistance” offered by Smith, asked the judge to reduce his sentence by 40 percent, and the judge agreed.

Smith recorded conversations he had with others before the FBI approached him and then recorded conversations at the request of the FBI, prosecutors said. He also met with the FBI multiple times and provided valuable information.

Federal prosecutors have not publicly identified the vendor they say gave Smith envelopes of cash at meetings at restaurants every other week for nearly two years, a total of more than 40 payments.

Smith’s attorneys submitted about 70 letters to the court from supporters and called five people to attest to Smith’s good character. All of them stressed Smith’s unwavering commitment to his family and community and called his illegal behavior an aberration.

“What he did was a mistake,” his brother Lance Smith said in court. “That is not the Adam Smith that we all know.”