RALEIGH, N.C. _ Former Adidas consultant T.J. Gassnola was sentenced to a one-year term of supervised release on Tuesday in a federal court in New York for his role in the sneaker company's pay-for-play scandal, which has ensnared N.C. State's basketball program in an NCAA probe.
Gassnola cooperated as a government witness and had previously plead guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Part of his sentencing on Tuesday included a two-month home detention, with electronic monitoring, and a $100 fine, according to court documents obtained by the News & Observer.
Gassnola testified in October during the high-profile case against former Adidas executive Jim Gatto, Adidas consultant Merl Code and aspiring agent Christian Dawkins that he had helped deliver a $40,000 payment to the family of former N.C. State star Dennis Smith Jr. during the Fayetteville guard's recruitment in 2015.
Gatto was convicted of wire fraud and wire fraud conspiracy and sentenced to nine months in prison in March. Code and Dawkins each received a six-month sentence for similar charges.
Under the federal-court ruling, N.C. State, Kansas and Louisville were have found to have been defrauded by Gatto for steering recruits to those Adidas-sponsored schools after knowingly making them ineligible with payments.
