An appeals court vacated Julie Chrisley’s sentence over fraud allegations. What comes next?
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.
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Now, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals says Julie Chrisley must be resentenced because the original sentence was based on a lack of evidence.
Channel 2′s Jorge Estevez spoke with a criminal defense attorney about the next steps in the process.
“The Court of Appeals found that the amount of money that she took, or is accused of taking, didn’t support the sentence that was imposed. And so they sent it back and asked the judge to recalculate that,” said Brian Mendelsohn, with the Mendelsohn Ertel Law Group.
Mendelsohn explained on WSB Tonight what could happen during this “recalculation.”
“The judge could look at it and say, ‘Yeah, I was wrong. The amount of money should be less, so your sentence should be less.’ But she also, he could look at it and say, I saw three weeks of trial. I think I got the sentence exactly right, and reimpose the exact same sentence.”
Mendelsohn said it can’t predict which way it will go for Julie Chrisley, but resentencing cases like this usually favors the defense.
“It’s always a good thing for criminal defense or for a criminal client to go back for re-sentencing. They often come out better, they will not come out worse,” he said.
RELATED STORIES:
- Todd Chrisley is dropping his appeal in ruling that he defamed revenue agent, owes her $755K
- Attorney for Todd, Julie Chrisley’s accountant asks to have his sentenced reduced
- Todd, Julie Chrisley unable to speak to each from prison on their 28th wedding anniversary
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