ATLANTA — The attorney for Julie Chrisley has filed his sentencing statement ahead of her resentencing hearing this week and is asking the judge in the case to give her no more than 60 months in prison.
An appeals court judge vacated Julie’s sentence in June over her 2022 fraud conviction with her husband Todd, whose 12-year sentence was upheld.
Last week, the government filed its sentencing recommendation, saying Julie should be resentenced for the same amount of time as her initial sentence – seven years.
Chrisley’s attorney said that in the 20 months she has been in prison, “Mrs. Chrisley has been a model inmate.”
“The parties agree that Mrs. Chrisley is entitled to a zero-point offender reduction, a new Guidelines provision that gives a defendant a two-level reduction if they have zero criminal history points. As a result, the parties agree that the adjusted Guideline range is 78 to 97 months,” the document said.
It also said that the amount of money that she should owe in restitution should be lowered to $4.7 million.
“At the first sentencing, the government recommended a within-guidelines sentence; at resentencing, the government will urge the Court to do the same, namely, to re-impose the same 84-month sentence, which is within the new adjusted guidelines range,” the government said in their filing.
Todd and Julie Chrisley, mostly known for their reality TV series “Chrisley Knows Best,” and Peter Tarantino, their accountant, were found guilty in 2022 of conspiring to defraud banks and the IRS out of millions of dollars and are serving a combined 15 years in prison.
The Chrisleys were originally sentenced to a combined 19 years in prison.
During their federal trial in 2022, prosecutors said the Chrisleys took out $30 million in fraudulent bank loans to fund their lavish lifestyle and extravagant spending even before they became reality television stars.
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They used a film production company they controlled to hide income to keep the IRS from collecting unpaid taxes owed by Todd Chrisley, prosecutors said.
Todd and Julie were charged with conspiracy to commit bank fraud, bank fraud, conspiracy to defraud the United States and tax fraud.
Julie Chrisley was also charged with wire fraud and obstruction of justice.
The Chrisleys were initially indicted in August 2019. Prosecutors said the couple submitted fake documents to banks when applying for loans.
Julie Chrisley sent a fake credit report and bank statements showing far more money than they had in their accounts to a California property owner in July 2014 while trying to rent a home.
A few months after they began using the home, in October 2014, they refused to pay rent, causing the owner to have to threaten them with eviction.
The money the Chrisleys received from their television show went to a company they controlled called 7C’s Productions, but they didn’t declare it as income on federal tax returns, prosecutors said.
The couple failed to file or pay their federal income taxes on time for multiple years.
The family had moved to Tennessee by the time the indictment was filed but the criminal charges stem from when they lived in Atlanta’s northern suburbs.
Channel 2 Action News first started investigating the Chrisleys in 2017, when we learned that Todd Chrisley had likely evaded paying Georgia state income taxes for several years.
Court documents obtained by Channel 2 Action News showed that by 2018, the Chrisleys owed the state nearly $800,000 in liens.
The couple eventually went to trial and a federal jury found them guilty of bank fraud and tax evasion.
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