After a three-day trial, the jury agreed with prosecutors that Robison convinced Joe Lonsdale, the downtown university’s co-founder and tech venture capitalist, to invest $1 million in a company that said it was buying 1,800 acres along the Colorado River outside Bastrop for a campus community. Instead, Robison absconded with the money.

“It’s somewhat embarrassing, but yeah I was tricked,” Lonsdale testified Wednesday.

Rather than the money being held in a bank account until another $1 million was raised to start the project, Robison siphoned off the money for himself. Bank records presented in court show that within a day of Lonsdale’s investment, Robison transferred $250,000 to another account he controlled. 

He was convicted of wire fraud and three counts of money laundering in a case touching powerful conservative circles and one of the richest men in the state.

Lonsdale has created a dozen successful companies and is no stranger to a financial deal. He commands as much as $8 billion in capital through 8VC, his venture capital firm. But somehow, he says, the 63-year-old Robison, with two bankruptcies and a checkered history of failed business ventures, got one over on him and his lawyers.

The crux of the defense was that Robison never intended to fail, that he did try to make the deal work but wasn’t very good at the endeavor.

“I won’t say John Robison’s the best businessman in the world,” his attorney George Lobb said in closing arguments. “In fact, I think he is the worst.”

The defense said the burden to prove Robison intended to make off with the money on Feb. 24, 2022 — the date of the wire transfer — was on the government. Robison’s attorneys said they didn’t think the government met that burden.

“The jurors had more than enough reasonable doubt,” said David White, another of Robison’s attorneys, attributing the verdict to the emotions of the jury rather than the law.

“When they hate the defendant, that’s it,” Lobb said. 

Dan Guess, chief of the Austin Division for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, said justice had been served. 

“The fraud was obvious,” he said. 

Sentencing will come at a later date, imposed by U.S. district court Judge Robert Pitman. Robison’s attorneys said they hadn’t decided if they would appeal the jury’s verdict. 

This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.