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FBI Probed SC State as Legislative Audit Unfolded

COLUMBIA, S.C. — In summer 2011, officials at South Carolina State University were defending the school’s transportation center, a multi-million-dollar project in which a state audit had found mismanagement and poor planning but no overt impropriety.

At the same time, unbeknownst to the Orangeburg school’s administration, federal officials were launching their own probe. That investigation came to light this week with the indictment of the former chairman of the school’s board of trustees and a guilty plea from S.C. State’s former chief of campus police. Prosecutors haven’t said their ongoing probe is linked to the transportation project, but a government watchdog said that could be where the investigation is headed.

On Thursday, Jonathan Pinson, a 42-year-old Greenville businessman who chaired S.C. State’s board for several years, pleaded not guilty to taking kickbacks. Former school police chief Michael Bartley has already admitted his role in a kickback conspiracy. And prosecutors say Pinson conspired with a third man, businessman Eric Robinson, to get favors in exchange for using Robinson’s entertainment company to promote a homecoming concert.

Pinson joined S.C. State’s board in 2005 and was its chair in June 2011, when the Legislative Audit Council said mismanagement and a lack of planning were largely to blame for construction delays at the school’s  James E. Clyburn James E. Clyburn  -Search using:News, Most Recent 60 DaysBiographies Plus NewsUniversity Transportation Center. Announced in 1998, the center named for U.S. Rep. Jim ClybburJim Clyburn,  -Search using:News, Most Recent 60 DaysBiographies Plus Newsn, an alumnus, was heralded as a showpiece for research and training.

But by 2006, the project had lost its federal designation. A federal audit of one grant found that financial records were confusing and that accountants couldn’t tell where money went. Construction began on land the university thought it owned but didn’t.

State auditors found no evidence of missing money but questioned spending and billing, noting the school didn’t have a viable plan to raise more than $80 million needed to complete the center. Since the audit, school officials have promised more oversight, and some work at the site is now under way.

As much of the attention on S.C. State remained focused on the audit, federal authorities got a tip from an informant and began their investigation into Pinson, prosecutors said Thursday. In July 2011, the FBI placed a wiretap on Pinson’s phone and, for several months, monitored his conversations with Bartley and a Florida businessman who hoped to sell a tract of Orangeburg County land to the university.

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