MIAMI, Fla. (CBS12) \u2014 A former member of the Florida House of Representatives was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison on Friday after being convicted of secretly working as an unregistered Venezuelan agent and laundering millions.<\/p>\n
U.S. District Judge Melissa Damian sentenced 61-year-old David Rivera on Friday after a federal jury found him guilty of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Agents Registration Act, violating FARA, conspiracy to commit money laundering and four counts of engaging in transactions involving criminally derived property.<\/p>\n
According to court records and evidence presented at trial, Rivera and lobbyist Esther Nuhfer<\/a> secured a $50 million contract with a subsidiary of Venezuela\u2019s state-owned oil company, Petr\u00f3leos de Venezuela, S.A., or PDVSA, per previous reports<\/a>.<\/p>\n Prosecutors said the pair used the contract to advance the interests of the Venezuelan government in the U.S. without registering as foreign agents as required by law.<\/p>\n Rivera and Nuhfer lobbied U.S. officials, including then-Sen. Marco Rubio and U.S. Rep. Pete Sessions, and arranged meetings between U.S. policymakers and high-ranking Venezuelan officials, including then-President Nicol\u00e1s Maduro<\/a> and then-Foreign Minister Delcy Rodr\u00edguez<\/a>, according to court records.<\/p>\n See also: Two men already behind bars now accused in January Riviera Beach murder<\/a><\/p>\n The pair also used coded language in text messages to describe their activities, prosecutors said.<\/p>\n The evidence showed Rivera deposited about $1.5 million in proceeds from the contract into his Florida state congressional campaign account between March 2017 and August 2018. Prosecutors also said he used the money for other personal expenses.<\/p>\n 52-year-old Nuhfer, used about $455,000 from the contract proceeds to purchase a residence in Key Colony Beach, according to prosecutors.<\/p>\n Nuhfer was previously sentenced to five years in federal prison after being convicted at trial of conspiracy to violate FARA, violating FARA, conspiracy to commit money laundering and engaging in a transaction involving criminally derived property.<\/p>\n \u201cToday\u2019s sentence reinforces a simple rule: foreign influence in America cannot operate in the shadows,\u201d U.S. Attorney Jason A. Reding Qui\u00f1ones<\/a> for the Southern District of Florida said.<\/p>\n Qui\u00f1ones said Rivera\u2019s conduct was particularly significant because he had previously represented a South Florida community with generations of families who fled communist oppression.<\/p>\n The FBI Miami Field Office<\/a> and IRS Criminal Investigation<\/a> investigated the case.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MIAMI, Fla. (CBS12) \u2014 A former member of the Florida House of Representatives was sentenced to 10 years…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":418544,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29],"class_list":["post-418543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=418543"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/418543\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/418544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=418543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=418543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=418543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}