Former Jackson County politician says prison time could be good for his health
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- John C. Carnes sentenced to 21 months for felony tax evasion, owes $794,540.
- Judge Sachs balanced competing requests for probation and maximum prison term.
- Carnes blames tax crimes on alcohol use, gambling, and financial distress.
More than three decades after serving two years of a five-year sentence on public corruption charges, a once-powerful Jackson County political figure is heading back to federal prison.
This time it’s for tax evasion. John C. Carnes was sentenced on Monday to 21 months of incarceration. But with good behavior and other reductions, Carnes figures he might be inside for half that.
“I look forward to do a little exercise and weight loss and rejuvenate my health a little bit, so that time away will help me,” the Independence attorney told The Star on Tuesday. “You might be envious. You might want to go out and commit a crime so you can join me.”
Prosecutors had recommended that Carnes, 70, serve the maximum penalty under the sentencing guidelines for someone with his criminal history: 33 months in prison and paying the back taxes he owes the Internal Revenue Service.
His defense lawyer, former prosecutor John Osgood, recommended that Carnes be sentenced to five years of probation, asserting that his client’s crimes were directly tied to his abuse of alcohol and excessive gambling. And both were triggered by Carnes’ inability to pay his taxes triggered by financial difficulties, Osgood said.
But if the court believed some prison time was absolutely necessary, one year and a day would be sufficient, Osgood argued in his sentencing memorandum.
U.S. District Judge Howard F. Sachs split the difference, imposing a sentence of nearly two years and ordered Carnes to pay back the taxes he owes: $794,540. Sachs also sentenced him to three years of probation after his release.
Carnes previously relinquished his license to practice law.
“The Court recommends that the defendant be designated to a medical facility for evaluation and possible treatment,” according to the court docket. “The defendant shall self-surrender to the institution designated by the BOP (Bureau of Prisons) on or before 2:00 p.m. on September 10, 2025.”
Carnes said he would welcome the treatment he might get at some place like the Medical Center for Federal Prisoners in Springfield, Missouri. After that, he can only guess how much time he will be in custody between prison and a halfway house.
“Obviously you get two months good time per year, then halfway house is a lot more liberal than it used to be. If you go anywhere from six, six months to a year, right?” he said. “I’ve been away from from the federal government lockup for a long time, but it looks like they’re trying to get people in and move them out.”
History of corruption
Carnes burst onto the greater Kansas City political scene at age 23, when he won a seat on the nonpartisan Independence City Council in 1978.
He went on to win re-election and become a dominant influence on the council and in county Democratic politics.
In 1984, he ran to replace U.S. Rep. Richard Bolling after the Kansas City congressman announced he was retiring from a seat he’d held since 1949. Carnes came close to winning the Democratic nomination, but lost to Alan Wheat, who went on to win in the general election that year.
Carnes’ fall from power came five years later, in 1989, are he was charged with six counts of paying and soliciting bribes, while he was on the Independence council, the Jackson County Legislature and as a private citizen.
In an agreement with prosecutors, he pleaded guilty to one of the bribery counts, which involved paying an Independence city councilman for his vote in a zoning matter. He also pleaded guilty to bank fraud.
After serving two years, he went into political exile. But after regaining his law license in 2006, his profile rose as he once again began representing clients who did business with Independence city government.
Attorney describes downfall
That year was also when he began experiencing financial difficulties, Osgood said in his court filing.
According to the federal government, he avoided paying federal taxes by depositing and drawing funds from the trust fund he maintained as an attorney for clients’ money, rather than from his personal bank account.,
”Carnes led a cash lifestyle to avoid paying taxes to the IRS” and to support his “excessive gambling,” prosecutors said in a sentencing memorandum that referenced the crimes he committed leading to his imprisonment 36 years ago.
“Carnes has shown himself to be an expert in deception -- whether he is engaged in hiding assets from the IRS, paying a bribe to a public official, or making false statements on loan documents to a financial institution.
“Carnes has advantages in education and income that many federal defendants do not have. Rather than use his advantages to improve his community, he used them to unjustly enrich himself. Given the nature and number of Carnes’s federal felony convictions, his history and characteristics justify a sentence at the high end of the guidelines. “
Osgood pleaded for the court’s mercy, stating that Carnes began drinking too much and became addicted to gambling after he fell behind on paying his taxes.
FBI sting
In a letter to Sachs, Carnes’ therapist and counselor at the Heartland Center for Behavioral Change said Carnes was diagnosed with moderate alcohol use disorder and adjustment disorder with anxiety and depression. He recommended that he remain free under supervised probation so he could continue receiving treatment.
Osgood maintained throughout the case that Carnes was the victim of “vindictive prosecution” by a federal government that charged him with tax evasion after the investigators were unable to assemble evidence implicating him in yet another public corruption investigation during the late 2010s.
Had he been anyone else, Osgood said, the tax avoidance case against Carnes would have been considered a civil matter and not one where he now will serve prison time.
“The third and final emotional monkey on his back was the initiation of an FBI investigation into allegations that he essentially controlled the City Counsel (sic) voting majority in Independence, Missouri<” he wrote.
“After nearly a decade no corruption charges were brought, however, he was then indicted on these tax charges.”
That FBI sting operation began in 2018 as local communities began implementing the state’s authorization of retail marijuana sales. Osgood said in an earlier court filing that undercover agents wanted to see if Carnes could put them in touch with politicians open to accepting bribes. They failed and no corruption charges were brought.
The tax case was filed in December 2022. Carnes was indicted on two felony counts – tax evasion and obstruction of IRS laws – and seven misdemeanor counts of failure to pay his taxes.
Last November, Carnes agreed to plead guilty to that one count of felony tax evasion, in exchange for the government dropping the other chrages.
Now that his sentencing is over, Carnes said he plans to write a critical report on the FBI investigation that led to his arrest.
“I’m going to critique my case as a case of incompetence on the FBI,” he said, “because this is absurd that I’m being convicted on a tax case that a junior accountant could figure out in one afternoon. And these guys spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in manpower and everything chasing me year round for the last seven years.”
He plans to share his report FBI Director Kash Patel and Attorney General Pam Bondi.
“It would be a good thing for the new leaders of the FBI and Justice Department to look into,” he said.
The FBI sting took place during President Trump’s first term and the grand jury indictment came while Joe Biden was president.
This story was originally published July 15, 2025 at 2:17 PM.
