( CNN ) -- A federal judge sentenced a former commercial pilot to six months in prison Friday , followed by six months of home detention , for being intoxicated while co-piloting a domestic flight , a federal prosecutor announced . Aaron Jason Cope , 33 , was found guilty in June of operating a common carrier under the influence of alcohol . He could have been ordered to serve as many as 15 years in prison and pay a fine of as much as $ 250,000 . U.S. District Court Judge John R. Tunheim , who oversaw the two-day bench trial , laid out a less-stringent sentence for Cope on Friday morning . After his initial year in prison and home detention , the sentence includes two years of supervised release . Cope was ordered to report to the U.S. Bureau of Prisons to begin serving his time by January 3 , according to a statement from John Walsh , U.S. attorney for the District of Colorado . `` The public rightly expects that airline pilots will not drink and fly , '' Walsh said . `` Because flying while intoxicated is a serious crime and puts the lives of passengers and people on the ground in danger , we will prosecute it swiftly and effectively -- every time . '' Cope was the first officer aboard United Express Flight 7687 on the morning of December 8 , 2009 , as it flew from Austin , Texas , to Denver . United Express is the name under which several regional airlines operate flights for United Airlines . Flight 7687 was operated by Shuttle America , a subsidiary of Republic Airways Holdings . According to court documents , the flight 's captain , Robert Obodzinski , testified that although his co-pilot `` appeared to be thinking and speaking clearly , every few minutes during the flight ( Obodzinski ) detected an unusual odor , which he eventually concluded was the smell of an alcoholic beverage . '' When the plane arrived in Denver , Obodzinski testified , he `` leaned over and took a big whiff '' and determined that the odor was coming from Cope . Cope had been the `` monitoring '' pilot on the flight and thus had not manipulated the plane 's controls . However , he was scheduled to fly the Embraer 170 aircraft on the next flight . The Embraer 170 has a seating capacity of 70 to 80 people . Once Cope returned to the cockpit after conducting a post-flight inspection , Obodzinski reportedly told him , `` if you have any problem taking a Breathalyzer , call off sick and get out of here . '' Cope then replied , `` Well , I guess I better call off sick then . '' Obodzinski , who had been on the phone with superiors while Cope was doing the inspection , was directed by his company to escort the co-pilot to an alcohol testing facility in Denver International Airport 's main terminal , according to trial documents . There , Cope 's blood alcohol content was found to be 0.094 % , more than twice as much as the Federal Aviation Administration-prohibited level of 0.04 % for any crew member of a civil aircraft . Republic Airways prohibits any crew member from working with a blood alcohol level above 0.02 % . At the testing facility , according to testimony , Cope admitted that he had gone to a bar with a friend and bought beer from a gas station near the hotel where he , Obodzinski and two flight attendants had stayed the previous night .
Obodzinski must serve 6 months in prison and 15 years of home detention . He could have gotten 6 months for `` operating a common carrier '' while intoxicated . He was the co-pilot on a 6 months flight from Colorado to Colorado .