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The 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals kept an extortion conviction in place in its ruling earlier this month, leaving the original sentencing judge, U.S. District Judge Dennis M. Cavanaugh, to whack the onetime Bergen County kingmaker’s initial 30-month term in September 2009 to 20 months.
He could also get an additional three months off for good behavior — meaning he could freed before the end of April.
It could come even earlier if federal prison authorities agree to let Coniglio begin home confinement to finish serving out his term.
Coniglio, 68, of Paramus, has spent more than 16 months at the federal prison camp in Lewisburg, Pa.
He originally was convicted of what federal prosecutors said were $113,000 in corrupt consulting payment from Hackensack University Medical Center in exchange for his juice in Trenton, obtaining grants and other benefits for the hospital.
But the U.S. Supreme Court last year narrowed the scope of the “honest services” fraud law used by prosecutors in the case, and the appeals court vacated a stack of mail fraud convictions against Coniglio.
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