Kohring to enter guilty plea

ANCHORAGE — Vic Kohring intends to change his plea to guilty this week, likely ending the years-long saga over allegations he took bribes from oil industry insiders while a member of the Legislature.

According to a motion filed Monday, Kohring will plead guilty to one count of “Conspiracy to Commit Extortion and Attempted Extortion Under Color of Official Right and Bribery.”

Kohring is set to enter his plea Friday, followed immediately by his sentencing on Friday.

Kohring was convicted of bribery and extortion in 2007 at a trial in which jurors saw him accept cash from Bill Allen, CEO of the now-defunct oilfield services company Veco. He was sentenced to three and a half years in prison and was serving his time in California when word came down that his case had been overturned in the wake of misconduct on the part of prosecutors in the trial of the late U.S. Sen. Ted Stevens.

Prosecutors had been apparently proceeding with re-trial preparations over the past year. Kohring represented Wasilla in the state house before he stepped down to focus on his legal defense.

“The only sentencing issues which have not been agreed upon between the parties are the length of any period of supervised release and the conditions of supervised release,” according to a motion filed by Kohring’s attorney.

It is unclear from the filings whether the parties have agreed to jail time or just a “supervised release” in which Kohring will likely have to check in with a parole officer and agree not to do certain things or risk returning to jail.