A Swedish national involved in the crash of a rare, red Ferrari Enzo in Malibu was sentenced Tuesday to three years in state prison after pleading no contest to embezzlement and being a felon with a firearm. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Patricia M. Schnegg also ordered Bo Stefan M. Eriksson, 44, to pay a $5,000 fine and to return to court Dec. 7 for a restitution hearing.
Eriksson, who was dressed in orange jail-issued clothes, entered his plea four days after a jury deadlocked 10-2 in favor of convicting him of four charges, including the two embezzlement counts to which he pleaded no contest.
Those charges involved a black Ferrari Enzo and a black Mercedes-Benz McLaren SLR that prosecutors contended were illegally shipped into the country from the United Kingdom. The cars have since been shipped back.
Two other counts of grand theft auto involving the high-end sports cars were dismissed as a result of the plea, and two counts involving the crashed Ferrari had been dropped Oct. 16, after Deputy District Attorney Tamara Hall said the prosecution was unable to proceed on those charges.
The judge said the three-year prison term will run at the same time as a six-month term stemming from Eriksson's no contest plea on Oct. 19 to a misdemeanor drunken driving charge involving the Feb. 21 crash of the red Ferrari Enzo on Pacific Coast Highway. Eriksson was driving about 160 mph at the time.
The former executive of the now-bankrupt video game company Gizmondo Europe was set to be tried separately — as soon as this week — on the charge of being a felon in possession of a firearm, stemming from the discovery of a .357-magnum Smith and Wesson handgun in his Bel Air home during an April 7 search.
But he pleaded no contest today to that charge and admitted he had been convicted in November 1994 in Stockholm, Sweden, of gross fraud by means of document forgery and complicity in gross fraud.
As a result of the plea, Eriksson's Bel-Air home — which was seized and is in receivership — will be sold, and any restitution ordered can be paid from the sale proceeds, according to the District Attorney's Office.
“It was a fair resolution,” Hall told reporters outside court after Eriksson's plea, noting that the resolution was “consistent with the majority of the jurors.”
One of Eriksson's attorneys, Alec Rose, said, “There was a meeting of the minds. That's why there's a settlement.”
The defense lawyer said he expects his client — who has been behind bars since his April 7 arrest — to be released from state prison between next November and early January 2008.
Rose said Eriksson will then be leaving the United States, but his whereabouts will involve “a decision that will be made at some point in the future.”
The prosecutor said she expects Eriksson to be deported after he serves his prison term and not to be allowed to return to the United States.
Before Eriksson's trial began, he turned down a plea offer that would have sent him to state prison for two years and four months.
“I cannot agree that I stole the car because I didn't,” Eriksson told the judge last month.
