An heir to the Seagram’s liquor fortune who supplied financial support to Keith Raniere, the disgraced chief of NXIVM, is set to face a federal judge on Wednesday when she could be sentenced to up to five a long time powering bars.
Clare Bronfman, the forty one-12 months-old daughter of late philanthropist and Seagram’s CEO Edgar Bronfman, admitted in a responsible plea last calendar year that she harbored a person who was dwelling in the U.S. illegally for unpaid “labor and services” and that she fully commited credit history card fraud on behalf of Raniere, who was convicted very last year of turning gals in his team into sexual intercourse slaves who have been branded with his initials.
Prosecutors want U.S. District Court docket Judge Nicholas G. Garaufis to sentence Bronfman to five several years in jail, arguing that her monetary guidance was the underpinning of the group NXIVM, pronounced “nexium.”
She gave tens of tens of millions of pounds to NXIVM, which operated a application of intense self-improvement lessons.
“There can be minor question that Raniere would not have been in a position to dedicate the crimes with which he was convicted had been it not for effective allies like Bronfman,” prosecutors said in court docket papers.
But protection legal professionals are asking for just probation, arguing that Bronfman had no direct involvement in NXIVM’s most troubling routines. In addition, Bronfman’s lawyers claimed she has pre-current health and fitness conditions that make her significantly at hazard for coronavirus if she’s despatched to jail.
Bronfman claimed in a letter to the court previous month that she “never meant to harm any individual, nonetheless I have and for this I am deeply sorry.
But she also preserved that “NXIVM and Keith considerably improved my life for the far better.”
As aspect of a plea agreement, the beverage heir has previously agreed to forfeit $6 million from a fortune prosecutors have said is value $two hundred million.
Raniere and NXIVM are very best identified for the involvement of “Smallville” actress Allison Mack in the group’s management structure.
Very last yr, Raniere was identified responsible of several rates together with racketeering, intercourse trafficking and possession of child pornography linked to his team which operated around Albany.
Each Raniere and Mack are awaiting sentencing.
David K. Li is a breaking news reporter for NBC Information.
The Involved Push contributed.