Texas AG Ken Paxton reaches deal to end securities fraud charges after 9 years

HOUSTON (AP) — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Tuesday agreed to pay nearly $300,000 in restitution under a deal to end criminal securities fraud charges that have shadowed the Republican for nearly a decade.

The announcement by special prosecutors in a Houston courtroom came less than three weeks before Paxton was set to stand trial on felony charges that could have led to a prison sentence. It was the closest Paxton — who was indicted in 2015 — has ever come to trial over accusations that he duped investors in a tech startup near Dallas. Under the 18-month pre-trial agreement, the special prosecutors would drop three felony counts against Paxton, while he must pay full restitution to victims, and complete 100 hours of community service and 15 hours of legal ethics education.

Paxton was in the courtroom but made no comment other than affirming to state District Judge Andrea Beall that his signature was on the agreement.

If he had been convicted, Paxton could have been sentenced to life in prison. Paxton’s attorneys emphasized in a statement Tuesday that he made no admission of guilt under the agreement. “This case has been pending literally longer than the Beatles were together — it was time to move on — and this proposal by the Special Prosecutors allows him to do just that,” said Don Cogdell, one of Paxton’s attorney.

The agreement with prosecutors, which lets Paxton remain in his elected position and doesn’t affect his law license, is another huge legal and political victory for one of the nation’s most visible Republican state attorney generals. The end of the case comes six months after Paxton was acquitted of corruption charges in an impeachment trial in the Texas Senate. Brian Wice, a Houston attorney who was assigned as a special prosecutor in the case, described the deal as a victory that requires Paxton to repay investors, one of whom is a former GOP lawmaker who served with Paxton in the Texas Legislature.

Wice acknowledged the long arc of the case that shuffled between four different judges over the years, pingponged between courtrooms in Dallas and Houston, and at one point was slowed by the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey in 2017.

“This case, no pun intended, was a perfect storm of everything that could have derailed and delayed the prosecution,” Wice said.

The resolution of the securities fraud case furthers a dramatic reversal of political fortune for Paxton, who just a year ago appeared imperiled by both the criminal case and the threat of being removed from office after his top aides reported him to the FBI...