Loaded on
July 15, 2025
published in Prison Legal News
July, 2025, page 15
On May 27, 2025, President Donald Trump (R) issued an unconditional pardon for Scott Jenkins, 53, a former Northern Virginia sheriff who was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for 12 counts of conspiracy, fraud, and bribery. The pardon reportedly came hours before Jenkins was due to report at the prison. As PLN reported, Jenkins received a jury conviction in December 2024 on charges related to taking bribes totaling more than $75,000 [See: PLN, Dec. 2024, p.61].
The ex-sheriff accepted the money in the form of campaign contributions from at least eight people, including two undercover FBI agents. In exchange, he appointed several local businessmen as “auxiliary deputy sheriffs” within his department. These positions allowed Jenkins to issue the men badges, identification cards, guns, and body armor, as well as grant them the ability to avoid traffic tickets and carry concealed firearms without a permit. Two of the appointees—Frederick Gumbinner and James Metcalf—had previously pleaded guilty and were sentenced in March 2025 to three years’ probation along with fines of $100,000 and $75,000, respectively.
Throughout the trial, Jenkins maintained his innocence despite a trove of photos, audio recordings, and videos that prosecutors claimed showed him accepting the bribes. …
