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 Steven Bateman, 59, had sought a more lenient sentence following
his conviction for illegally lobbying for a construction deal while
he was the mayor of Homestead, a Miami suburb, between 2009 and
2013.
He had been seeking a sentence of no more than six months in prison,
spread out over two years, from Florida Circuit Judge Robert Luck,
according to his attorney. Batemen was allowed to remain free on
bond pending appeal.
In September, a jury found him guilty of two felony counts of
illegal compensation, one of which was later overturned by the judge
due to insufficient evidence, said Michael Davis, one of the
attorneys representing Bateman.
 The former mayor also was found guilty of a misdemeanor charge of
illegal lobbying, which still stands.
Bateman was paid $125 an hour to persuade his city council to speed
up the construction of a mental health facility for children,
according to prosecutors at a hearing earlier this year. They said
the mayor also met with the Miami-Dade County mayor about the deal.
During his weeklong trial, Bateman's attorneys argued that his
client had kept his public and private roles separate.
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Bateman is one of nearly a half dozen Miami-area mayors to face
charges of wrongdoing in the past two years. Earlier this week,
former North Miami Mayor Marie Lucie Tondreau, the city’s first
female Haitian-American mayor, was found guilty in a mortgage fraud
scheme.
(Editing by Letitia Stein and Jonathan Oatis)
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