Grammy winner Prakazrel “Pras” Michel from the Fugees has been handed a 14-year prison sentence after being found guilty of secretly funneling millions in foreign cash into Barack Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign. It is a dramatic fall for the 52-year-old musician who chose not to speak in court before Judge Colleen Kollar Kotelly delivered the sentence on Thursday.
Michel was convicted last year on ten counts, including conspiracy and acting as an unregistered agent for a foreign government. The trial in Washington drew plenty of attention with appearances from Leonardo DiCaprio and former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, both called to testify.
Prosecutors pushed for a sentence far harsher than the one he received. They said federal guidelines recommended life in prison and accused Michel of having “betrayed his country for money” while lying “unapologetically and unrelentingly to carry out his schemes.”
In their filing, they argued that “his sentence should reflect the breadth and depth of his crimes, his indifference to the risks to his country and the magnitude of his greed.”
Michel’s lawyer Peter Zeidenberg said the punishment is “completely disproportionate to the offense” and confirmed that Michel will appeal both the conviction and the sentence. Zeidenberg had argued for just three years behind bars.
Michel’s legal team also called the idea of a life sentence “absurdly high,” pointing out that such penalties are usually reserved for terrorists and cartel bosses. They even compared the government’s stance to something that “would cause Inspector Javert to recoil,” saying the guidelines can be twisted to create “absurd results.”
Michel grew up in Brooklyn after his parents immigrated from Haiti and went on to form the Fugees with Lauryn Hill and Wyclef Jean. The group became one of the most influential acts in hip hop, selling tens of millions of records and winning two Grammys.
According to the Justice Department, Michel received more than $120 million from Malaysian billionaire Low Taek Jho, better known as Jho Low. He then directed some of that money through straw donors to support Obama’s campaign.
Prosecutors said Michel did not stop there. They accused him of trying to derail a Justice Department investigation into Low, tampering with witnesses and lying under oath during the trial.
Low, who has been living in China, is a fugitive and still insists he is innocent. He was one of the main financiers behind “The Wolf of Wall Street,” the DiCaprio film that also came up during the trial. Michel’s lawyers argued that Low’s goal was not political influence but simply a photograph with Obama.
“Low’s motivation for giving Mr. Michel money to donate was not so that he could achieve some policy objective. Instead, Low simply wanted to obtain a photograph with himself and then President Obama,” they wrote.
The case took another twist last summer when the judge rejected Michel’s bid for a new trial. He had claimed his previous lawyer mishandled the defence, even using a generative AI tool when preparing closing arguments. The judge ruled that those issues did not amount to a serious miscarriage of justice.
