accessed 30 January 2016 On December 12, 2014, MSNBC news also reported on the indictments, discussing the context of the private management of prisons in Mississippi and problems revealed in poor conditions and treatment of prisoners. Jody Owens, attorney and investigator with the Southern Poverty Law Center, who has also worked on the EMCF case, was interviewed on The Docket about these bribery allegations. In February 2015 Epps pleaded guilty to corruption-related charges: one count of filing a false tax return and one count of conspiracy to launder money. As part of the plea, he forfeited two Mercedes Benz vehicles and his two residences. Cecil McCrory also pleaded guilty to reduced federal charges. Epps and McCrory each said the other had initiated the bribery scheme. Both men were scheduled to be sentenced on June 9, 2015, but on June 8 federal authorities announced that the sentencing was indefinitely delayed. They said they were pursuing additional indictments. As of February 2017, McCrory has been sentenced and Epps is held in jail pending a sentencing hearing in May 2017. Besides McCrory, two others pleaded guilty to bribing Epps, and another pleaded not guilty. Harrison County political operative Robert Simmons pleaded guilty to one count of bribery relating to kickbacks he paid to Epps for contracts covering probation services, construction, and construction management. He was scheduled to be sentenced on May 26, 2016. Simmons was also accused of bribing a Harrison County supervisor for a jail medical contract. Carthage, Mississippi businessman and consultant Sam Waggoner pleaded guilty in August 2015 to one count of bribery after waiving indictment in an agreement with prosecutors. He told federal District Court Judge Henry Travillion Wingate that he paid more than $108,000 in kickbacks to Epps from a consulting contract with prison phone company Global Tel-Link (GTL). GTL had a monopoly with the state on phone business in prisons. Waggoner was scheduled to be sentenced on April 14, 2016. Former state lawmaker Irb Benjamin of Madison, Mississippi pleaded not guilty to bribery charges. He is scheduled for trial July 5, 2016, on charges of conspiracy to commit honest services wire fraud and bribery of Epps for contracts at prison work centers and county jails. In 2016, Cecil McCrory requested that the court allow him to withdraw from the plea bargain and plead "not guilty", going to trial. The court postponed sentencing of Epps again, and ultimately rejected