Political Operative Gets|Two Years in Prison

(CN) - A former political operative was sentenced to two years in prison Friday for funneling $325,000 in political action committee money into the coffers of a congressional candidate whose finances he was handling.

Tyler Harber pleaded guilty in February to illegally coordinating campaign spending between a political action committee he helped create -- the National Republican Victory Fund -- and the campaign of Chris Perkins, whose Virginia congressional campaign he was managing in 2012.

Perkins ultimately lost.

Appearing before U.S. District Judge Liam O'Grady in the Alexandria, Va. Federal Court Friday morning, Harber said he's a competitive person by nature, and he simply got carried away.

"I knew it was wrong when I did it," he told O'Grady. "I wasn't thinking clearly."

Harber also pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI agents who investigated his activities.

Prosecutors had sought a sentence of nearly four years in prison, contending that Harber knew exactly what he was doing, and cavalierly did everything he could to hide it from his party and law enforcement officials.

But Harber's attorneys, Geremy Kamens and Shannon Quill, said the consultant, once a rising star in the Republican party, has already lost "everything" and will most likely never work in politics again.

They noted that Harber shut down his political consultancy last year in anticipation of his guilty plea, and that he hasn't worked since.

Kamens and quill also noted that Harber, a married father of two, is headed to jail while leaving his family in serious financial straits. His wife, Cristin Harber, writes romance novels, and his one-year-old son suffers from a breathing disorder. He also has a 3-year-old daughter.

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