By Kelly Heyboer/ The Star-Ledger
Former Brookdale College President Peter Burnham (right) pleads guilty at the Monmouth County Courthouse in Freehold. He plead guilty to three charges including misuse of a college credit card. Looking on is defense attorney Steven Secare. 7/24/12 John O’Boyle/The Star-Ledger
Former Brookdale College President Peter Burnham pleads guilty. gallery (5 photos)
Former Brookdale Community College president Peter Burnham was sentenced to five years in prison today for official misconduct and theft, completing the dramatic fall of one of the state’s top higher education leaders.
A haggard-looking Burnham, 68, was sentenced at Monmouth County Courthouse in Freehold. As expected, Superior Court Judge Thomas Scully gave the former college president the five year sentence — with the possibility of parole in two years — that Burnham and prosecutors had agreed on in a plea deal earlier this year.
The judge also ordered Burnham to pay $44,497 in restitution to Brookdale Community College, though most of that money will come from unused vacation pay due to the former president.
Burnham resigned from his $216,000-a-year post last year after a campus audit at the two-year college concluded he spent thousands of dollars on unauthorized hotel stays, clothing purchases, meals and alcohol. Brookdale officials turned the information over to prosecutors.
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