Munish Sood, a New Jersey-based financial adviser who was one of 10 men arrested by the FBI in September 2017 as part of the federal government's investigation into bribes and other corruption in college basketball, has pleaded guilty to three felony counts, according to federal court records.
Sood, the CEO and chief investment officer of Princeton Advisory Group in Princeton, New Jersey, was accused of bribing three assistant coaches -- Arizona's Emanuel "Book" Richardson, Oklahoma State's Lamont Evans (who was working at South Carolina at the time) and USC's Tony Bland -- with thousands of dollars to influence their players to choose him as a financial adviser once they turned pro.
According to a plea agreement filed earlier this week in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, Sood pleaded guilty to felony conspiracy to commit bribery, honest services fraud and travel act offenses; payments of bribes to an agent of a federally funded organization; and wire fraud conspiracy.
Sood admitted to working with others in "paying bribes to the NCAA men's college basketball coaches, in exchange for which these coaches agreed to and did exercise their influence as coaches for their respective universities to persuade and pressure student-athletes to retain the services of Sood, among others," according to the plea agreement.
Sood wasn't indicted along with the other eight defendants in November, leading many attorneys involved in the cases to believe that he was negotiating a plea agreement with the U.S. Attorney's Office in exchange for his cooperation in the cases.
As part of the plea agreement, sources told ESPN on Friday, Sood is expected to testify against the other defendants in at least two of the government's three criminal cases related to college basketball corruption.
Sood and Christian Dawkins, a former AAU director and runner for former NBA agent Andy Miller, formed their own sports management firm in 2017. Sood was accused of arranging at least $22,000 in payments to Evans and also directing payments to Bland and Richardson in exchange for their influence.
Adidas executives James Gatto and Merl Code and Dawkins are scheduled to go on trial in U.S. District Court in New York on Oct. 1.
Former Auburn assistant Chuck Person and former NBA referee Rashan Michel are scheduled for trial on Feb. 4; Bland, Evans, Dawkins and Richardson are scheduled for trial on April 22.