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Louisville – www.usatoday.com – Calling her crime “brazen,” a federal judge sentenced Karen Cunagin Sypher Friday to seven years and three months in prison for trying to extort cash, cars and other payments from University of Louisville basketball coach Rick Pitino.

U.S. District Judge Charles R. Simpson III also ordered Sypher, 50, to serve two years of supervised release. He told Sypher to have no contact with Pitino or his family during her release.

Simpson called Sypher’s crime a “serious offense.”

“It was brazen,” the judge said. “It was driven apparently by sheer greed.”
Government prosecutors have asked that Sypher to be taken into custody immediately, arguing that she is a danger to witnesses because she has made allegations of child abuse against her ex-husband, Tim Sypher, who works with Pitino.

Over the objections of a Courier-Journal reporter, Simpson has closed the hearing so that prosecutors could put on witnesses to the child abuse claims.

After the sentence Sypher dabbed tears from her eyes and spoke only briefly, thanking her legal team for “at least allowing some of the evidence” to be heard Friday, including testimony from her son and an investigator.

Sypher’s attorney, David Nolan Sr. of Washington, argued during sentencing that his client is the victim, not the victimizer. He argued for leniency, saying Sypher had no criminal record.

Sypher’s son Jacob Wise said after the sentencing that he was “devastated.”

“It’s like a nightmare I can’t wake up from,” Wise said, calling the sentence “absolutely absurd. We never had a fair trial.”

Sypher was convicted after an eight-day trial in August of lying to the FBI, retaliating against a witness and extortion for trying to force Pitino to give her money and other items in exchange for her silence on her allegations that he raped her twice in 2003, including once at a Louisville restaurant.

She didn’t report the alleged rapes until six years later, after she was charged with extortion, and Commonwealth’s Attorney Dave Stengel later ruled that her allegations were without merit. Pitino acknowledged he had sex once with Sypher, at the Porcini restaurant, but said it was consensual.

The maximum sentence on those charges was 26 years, but under federal sentencing guidelines, criminal defense lawyers predicted she would be sentenced to between five and 10 years. There is no parole for federal offenses.

Sypher’s sentencing was delayed twice as her new defense team filed motions for a new trial, claiming that Simpson, the prosecution and Sypher’s trial counsel, James Earhart, who she fired after her conviction, conspired against her to protect Pitino’s reputation.

Simpson and a federal appeals court denied the motions, saying they could be raised when she appeals her conviction.

Assistant U.S. Attorneys John Kuhn Jr. and Marisa Ford denied her allegations, saying her trial was fair and that her motions were designed only to delay her incarceration.