Nutting not guilty of felonies, guilty of misdemeanors
By Peter Hecht, Sacramento Bee
El Dorado County Supervisor Ray Nutting was found not guilty today on three felony charges of political malfeasance, but was convicted of six misdemeanors for improperly raising bail to free himself from jail.
The charges stemmed from income Nutting received from a state fire safety program for clearing brush on his ranch. Prosecutors alleged that Nutting failed to disclose tens of thousands of dollars, faced a conflict of interest when he voted to fund local resource agencies and took illegal loans from government employees to post bail.
Though the El Dorado Superior Court jury in Placerville found Nutting not guilty on three felonies, it was hung on a fourth felony count alleging that Nutting fabricated documents related to herbicide treatment for which he was reimbursed by the state.
Had Nutting been convicted of a felony, he would have had to relinquish his county supervisor post under state law. After the verdict, Nutting walked from his defendant’s chair into the courtroom gallery, hugged his wife and cried.