Former Mingo County prosecutor Sparks begins serving 12-month sentence at federal prison in Oxford, Wisconsin

Former Mingo County, West Virginia prosecutor Michael Sparks, sentenced to a year behind bars for depriving a Delbarton businessman of his constitutional rights, has begun serving his sentence at a federal prison in Oxford, Wisconsin.

He was sentenced July 7 to a year in prison because he didn't stop former Mingo County circuit judge Michael Thornsbury and former Mingo County commissioner David Baisden from coercing a drug defendant into changing attorneys to protect another member of the Mingo County political hierarchy, former sheriff Eugene Crum.

Crum, murdered in April 2013 as he sat in his cruiser in front of the courthouse, allegedly owed businessman George White $3,000 for campaign signs. Rather than pay him, Crum arranged to have a confidential informant buy prescription painkillers from White and then had him arrested.

Sparks, who cooperated with the investigation, failed to request immunity.

Federal prosecutors acknowledged the information, documentation and testimony he'd provided helped win convictions against Thornsbury, but said he nonetheless needed to be held accountable for his role in the conspiracy and charged the former prosecutor with the lesser misdemeanor of depriving White of his rights.