Former Speaker Sentenced for Cheating on Taxes

FRESNO — Former state Assembly speaker Brian Setencich was ordered Tuesday to spend seven months at a halfway house for cheating on his taxes.

Setencich, a special assistant to San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown, was convicted by a federal jury in June of looting his campaign account and understating his 1996 income by $19,300.

The former Fresno city councilman, who maintains he is innocent, was cleared of filing a false 1997 tax return and also acquitted of bribery and mail fraud charges that arose from the city’s “Operation Rezone” corruption probe. More than a dozen politicians and developers were convicted in the investigation.

Setencich, 38, claims the government retaliated against him after he testified as a character witness for Fresno developer Rod DeLuca, who was acquitted in the six-year investigation.

When indicted in 1998, Setencich was accused of taking money as a Fresno city councilman in 1993 from local businessman Robert Yang in exchange for waiving rental fees at the Fresno Convention Center.