SANTA ANA, Calif. (CN) — Former Anaheim Mayor Harry Sidhu was sentenced to two months in jail on Friday, having pleaded guilty to charges that he obstructed a federal investigation into the city’s aborted sale of Angel Stadium.
“I do believe the defendant did betray the trust of the city of Anaheim while he was serving as its mayor,” U.S. District Judge John Holcomb said after reading the sentence, which was less than the eight months federal prosecutors had requested. “In view of Mr. Sidhu’s significant cooperation, admission of his guilt, his age, his health, I think that warrants a significant downward variance. I think it’s significant for anybody to be incarcerated for any time.”
Sidhu was also fined $55,000.
Now 67, Sidhu was born in India — his real name is Harish Singh Sidhu — and, according to a letter he submitted to the judge before sentencing, he immigrated to the U.S. with just $6 in his pocket. He became a successful engineer and businessman, served on Anaheim’s city council for four years and was elected mayor in 2018. He resigned in 2022 after word spread that he was under federal investigation.
The same day he resigned, the Anaheim city council voted to call off a 2020 agreement to sell Angel Stadium, which the city has leased to the baseball team since 1966. The sale had been heavily criticized as a sweetheart deal, costing the Angels owners just $150 million despite being worth much more than that.
In 2023, Sidhu pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud, one count of obstruction of justice and two counts of making false statements to the FBI and the Federal Aviation Administration. In the plea agreement, Sidhu admitted to providing “confidential inside information” to the then-CEO of the Anaheim Chamber of Commerce, Todd Ament, who was was also working as a consultant to the Angels while they were trying to buy the stadium. Ament would himself later plead guilty to wire fraud; he had been recorded by the FBI describing a small group of Anaheim business leaders and consultants as a “cabal” who ran the city.
Ament began cooperating with investigators, who had started targeting the mayor. Fifteen months after the stadium sale was approved, Ament secretly recorded Sidhu saying that he expected a $1 million campaign contribution from the Angels after the sale went through.
“Rather than work to ensure the city of Anaheim received the best deal possible from the Angels, defendant worked behind the scenes to make the potential deal better for the Angels,” federal prosecutors wrote in their sentencing memo, “and as defendant later acknowledged in a recorded phone call, did so with the expectation that he would receive a significant campaign contribution of at least $1 million.”
Sidhu admitted to destroying email messages and documents in an attempt to cover up double-dealing, as well as lying to FBI agents when they questioned him. He also pleaded guilty to one count relating to the 2020 purchase of a used helicopter for $205,000. He filled out a form stating he lived in Scottsdale, Arizona, in order to avoid paying more than $15,000 in sales taxes.
“All I have to say your honor is I’m ashamed,” Sidhu said in court, shortly before the sentence was read. In the letter he submitted to the judge, he said his actions were aimed at keeping the Angels in Anaheim.
“Losing the Angels would have been devastating to the city,” he wrote. He expressed regret for sending the confidential information, “even though doing this was not a crime.”
“Mr. Sidhu was trying to get a deal done,” his attorney, Paul Meyer, told the judge during the sentencing hearing. As for the information he forwarded to the Angels’ consultant, it “didn’t affect the outcome of the deal. It’s a relevant document to the investigation. But it’s not especially relevant.”
He added that there was never any promise of payment, nor any payment. “There isn’t any agreement, there isn’t any ask, there’s no payment,” Meyer said. “You have, 16 months later, offhand, boastful comments to someone.”
His colleague Craig Wilke added: “There’s no public corruption going on.”
In their sentencing memo, Sidhu’s attorneys asked that their client be given probation instead of prison time.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Melissa Rabbani credited Sidhu with pleading guilty, resigning and repaying the taxes he’d owed. But she argued that the mayor had committed a serious crime that deserved a prison sentence.
“We don’t have any evidence of any ask or solicitation,” Rabbani said. “But the statement was clear evidence of his state of mind. That’s a big part of this case. The defendant betrayed this city with the expectation of getting a political benefit for himself.”
A number of Anaheim activists showed up in court for the hearing. Afterward, many of them said they’d been hoping for a longer sentence.
“This sentence does not send a statement that you can’t lie to the FBI,” said Anaheim resident Mike Robbins of the People’s Homeless Task Force. “It should’ve been a year at least. It should’ve been two years.”
Sidhu, who declined to comment after the sentence was handed down, agreed to surrender himself on Sept. 2.