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Jerome Prince was sentenced to one year of probation Thursday morning in U.S. District Court in Hammond. (Photo/Calvin Davis of Capital B)

This story was originally published by Capital B Gary.

By Calvin Davis
Capital B Gary
January 16, 2025

Jerome Prince, the former mayor of Gary, was sentenced Thursday in federal court to one year of probation and fined $26,750 for using campaign funds to buy a private residence.

Prince, who pleaded guilty last year to misusing campaign funds, admitted in court documents to defrauding donors by falsely claiming their contributions were for campaign purposes. Instead, he misappropriated roughly $26,750 from his mayoral campaign between 2019 and 2020 to help finance a personal real estate transaction.

“I misled donors by falsely representing and causing to be falsely represented, directly and by omission, that donations made to the Committee to Elect Jerome Prince for Mayor campaign Committee were being used for campaign purposes, when, in fact, I used a portion of the money provided by donors to the Committee to Elect Jerome Prince for Mayor campaign Committee for my own personal purposes, including using committee funds as part of the real estate transaction to finance the purchase of my personal residence,” Prince said in his plea agreement.

In exchange for his guilty plea in October to a wire fraud charge, federal prosecutors agreed that no additional charges would be filed against Prince regarding his misuse of campaign funds, according to court records. The agreement also stipulated that no other individuals could face charges for misusing Prince’s campaign funds. According to court records, the charge of wire fraud could have carried a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000.

A Gary native and graduate of Lew Wallace High School, Prince began his political career after serving in the U.S. Marines. He became a precinct committeeman and was elected to the Gary Common Council in 2000.

Prince, who won the Democratic primary for mayor in May 2019 by defeating incumbent Karen Freeman-Wilson, went on to win the general election that same year. Before becoming mayor, Prince spent over two decades in public service, serving as the Lake County assessor, a Lake County councilman, and a Gary city councilman. Prince was defeated in his 2023 bid for reelection by current Mayor Eddie Melton in the Democratic primary.

Calvin Davis is Capital B Gary’s government and politics reporter. You can reach Calvin at calvin.davis@capitalbnews.org.

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