Jemal's Good Works Pay Rich Dividend

Douglas Jemal isn't your average big-city developer. Not by a long stretch.

His multimillion-dollar business overseeing at least 185 properties is run like a small, informal family store -- and its "executives' meetings" look more like a family gathering at a boisterous pizza parlor than a session in a stuffy business boardroom. With his main offices in Chinatown adorned by a stocked bar and the company parrot, the 64-year-old executive kicks up his cowboy boots and his deputies laugh, eat and generally have a good time. Deals are done with a nod. Paperwork is an afterthought.

Those unorthodox ways got Jemal in a heap of legal trouble with criminal prosecutors over the last four years, leading to a felony conviction for defrauding a mortgage company this fall. But last week, they also saved Jemal from prison.

More than 200 people in this city and beyond rushed to vouch for Jemal, sharing stories of the great kindnesses and honesty that the high school dropout had shown them. They urged a federal judge to be lenient in sentencing him. They repeatedly claimed that the same eccentric impulses that led Jemal to buy abandoned buildings on gut instinct and do business based on trust also made him a man who gave thousands of dollars to struggling employees and strangers and lent a hand when it did nothing to boost his own fortunes.

U.S. District Judge Ricardo M. Urbina stunned prosecutors Tuesday by sentencing Jemal to probation for the felony fraud conviction -- when federal guidelines recommended a three-year prison sentence. The judge said the supporters' letters and testimony showcased a lifetime of good deeds and that such a genuine outpouring led to his decision.

The community support and the judge's mercy forced many in Washington to reflect on the corruption case federal prosecutors so vigorously brought. Had prosecutors hastily concluded that Jemal was running a criminal scheme, some city leaders wondered, when he may have been guilty only of sloppy business practices and questionable shortcuts? Or had the Brooklyn native -- who loved his adopted city so much and was so beloved in return -- gotten lucky and escaped years behind bars?

U.S. Attorney Jeffrey A. Taylor said he was "very disappointed" with the sentence. The prosecution's case began unraveling last fall when the jury acquitted Jemal of the most serious charges -- allegations that he bribed a D.C. government official.

Taylor said his office had a "clear duty" to prosecute the prominent developer. He noted that Jemal's attorney acknowledged that Jemal provided an expensive watch and other gifts to the city property official, who signed off on roughly $100 million worth of leases to Douglas Development Corp. The former official, Michael Lorusso, pleaded guilty to taking bribes and testified against Jemal at the trial.

"We're concerned about the message this sends, both to law-abiding and not law-abiding businesses and to city officials," he said. "It cannot be the case, that, as a citizen of the District of Columbia, that this is the way that business is done."

Prosecutors had some success going after Jemal's business team. Jemal deputy Blake Esherick recently was sentenced to eight months in prison for the wire fraud and two additional convictions for evading tax on money Jemal gave him. Jemal's chief financial officer, John E. Brownell, pleaded guilty to a similar tax evasion scheme and faces sentencing in June.

Jemal's supporters, including a diverse mix of business owners, recovering addicts, immigrants starting fledgling businesses, former city officials and tenants, said they were not contesting the conviction, in which a jury found that Jemal had skirted the law and misled a partner to get access to $430,000 and buy a new building.

The friends, most of them people who had done business with Jemal, simply argued that it was impossible that he had done this with greed or crime in his heart.