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An appeals court has upheld the 25-year prison sentence given to Long Island Ponzi scheme artist Nicholas Cosmo.
The ruling handed down Thursday by the Second Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals said that the length of the prison time given in the case wasn't unreasonable, especially in light of Cosmo's earlier fraud conviction and prison stretch 12 years ago. The decision called Cosmo, 41, "a recidivist offender who began committing the instant crime within months of finishing his previous fraud sentence."
Cosmo was sentenced to 25 years in prison and ordered to pay $179 million in restitution by Judge Denis Hurley in October 2011. He called Cosmo "reckless," with...