Oliver Leon Robinson Jr (born March 13, 1960) is a retired American basketball player who played

shooting guard The shooting guard (SG), also known as the two, two guard or off guard,Shooting guards are 6'3"–6'7"BBC Sports academy URL last accessed 2006-09-09. is one of the five traditional positions in a regulation basketball game. A shooting guard's m ...

for the NBA's

San Antonio Spurs The San Antonio Spurs are an American professional basketball team based in San Antonio. The Spurs compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Western Conference Southwest Division. The team plays its home ...

. He served as a Democratic member of the Alabama House of Representatives from 1998 to 2016, representing Alabama House District 58 (Birmingham). In September 2017 Robinson pleaded guilty to federal charges of bribery, conspiracy,

honest services fraud Honest services fraud is a crime defined in (the federal mail and wire fraud statute), added by the United States Congress in 1988, which states "For the purposes of this chapter, the term ''scheme or artifice to defraud'' includes a scheme or ...

and

tax evasion Tax evasion is an illegal attempt to defeat the imposition of taxes by individuals, corporations, trusts, and others. Tax evasion often entails the deliberate misrepresentation of the taxpayer's affairs to the tax authorities to reduce the tax ...

. FBI and IRS investigations determined that Robinson endeavored to thwart the

Environmental Protection Agency A biophysical environment is a biotic and abiotic surrounding of an organism or population, and consequently includes the factors that have an influence in their survival, development, and evolution. A biophysical environment can vary in scale f ...

's proposed efforts to prioritize and expand the 35th Avenue Superfund site in

North Birmingham North Birmingham is a community of Birmingham in Jefferson County, Alabama, United States. Currently the North Birmingham community is further subdivided into six neighborhoods: Acipco-Finley, Collegeville, Fairmont, Harriman Park, Hooper City, ...

pursuant to a secret contract he had entered into with a lawyer with the Birmingham law firm Balch & Bingham on behalf of its client, coal miner and processor

Drummond Company Drummond Company, Inc. is a privately owned company based in Birmingham, Alabama, United States, involved in the mining and processing of coal and coal products as well as oil and real estate. History The company was founded in Jasper, Alabama in ...

Early life

Robinson graduated from Woodlawn High School in Birmingham in 1978 and enrolled in the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB). After a season with the

, a year in the Continental Basketball Association, and a year spent touring with Athletes in Action, he returned to UAB to graduate in 1987 with a B.S. in Urban Affairs and minors in political science, business and sociology. After graduation he worked as vice president of AmSouth Bank and manager of its Office of Community Affairs. In 1999, the year after he was elected to the House, he cofounded ABI Capital Management, an investment advisory firm and underwriter, with Willie Huff. With his wife Sakina, also a UAB graduate, he founded Robinson & Robinson Communications. The couple published the biannual ''Community Reinvestor'' magazine.

Basketball career

Robinson was a 6'4" guard born in

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Birmingham is the seat of Jefferson County, Alabama's most populous county. As of the 2021 census estimates, Birmingham had a population of 197,575, down 1% fr ...

who played collegiately at the

University of Alabama at Birmingham The University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) is a Public university#United States, public List of research universities in the United States, research university in Birmingham, Alabama. Developed from an academic extension center established i ...

. He has the distinction of being the first player to ever sign a scholarship with the school. At UAB, Robinson was a two-time first team All- Sun Belt Conference pick and was the conference Player of the Year in 1982. In his senior year, Robinson led UAB to their best season as the Blazers went 25–6 and upset No. 1 seed

Virginia Virginia, officially the Commonwealth of Virginia, is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern regions of the United States, between the Atlantic Coast and the Appalachian Mountains. The geography and climate of the Commonwealth ar ...

in the NCAA Tournament to reach the Mideast Regional Final, where he was named the Regional MVP. Robinson's number was later retired by the school. Following his collegiate career, Robinson was drafted by the

in the second round of the 1982 NBA Draft (24th pick overall). Robinson played in 35 games for the Spurs in the 1982–83 NBA season, averaging 2.9 points per game in limited minutes. He was elected to the

Alabama Sports Hall of Fame The Alabama Sports Hall of Fame (ASHOF) is a state museum located in Birmingham, Alabama, dedicated to communicating the state’s athletic history. The museum displays over 5,000 objects related to athletes who were born in Alabama or earned fame ...

in 2008.

Political career

Robinson represented the 58th District in the Alabama House of Representatives from 1998 to 2016. At the time of his resignation in 2016 he was the vice-chairman of the Jefferson County Legislative Delegation. He served on the Banking and Insurance, House Education Policy, Financial Services, Military and Veterans Affairs, and Rules committees and had chaired the House Government Operations Committee. On November 30, 2016, in a press release, Robinson said he wanted to vacate his seat so that his daughter, Amanda Robinson, could keep a job to which she had been appointed as liaison between the Alabama legislature and Governor Robert Bentley's office, and thus avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest. He pointed out that his daughter would be the first African-American and the first female in Alabama history to hold that position, and said, "This is why I am retiring now, to give my child every opportunity to succeed." He intended to "focus on the children where I once lived, Gate City and Harris Homes." Six months later in June 2017, Robinson abruptly announced he was leaving his seat and permanently retiring from politics.

Corruption charges

In 2017 he was charged and entered into a plea agreement relating to allegations that business interests funneled money into his

eponym An eponym is a person, a place, or a thing after whom or which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. The adjectives which are derived from the word eponym include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''. Usage of the word The term ''epon ...

ous nonprofit in exchange for Robinson's opposition to polluted Birmingham neighborhoods being designated EPA Superfund sites. Later in the month two

Balch & Bingham Balch & Bingham LLP is a United States law firm based in Birmingham, Alabama. History The firm was founded in 1922 by William Logan Martin Jr, who served as Alabama's Attorney General between 1915-1917 and as attorney for Alabama Power Compan ...

partners working in its Environmental and Natural Resources section, Joel Gilbert, and section chair, Steve McKinney, along with

vice-president of government affairs David Roberson, were indicted on "one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States, one count of bribery, three counts of honest services wire fraud, and one count of money laundering conspiracy," with charges against McKinney later dismissed. On September 27, 2018, Robinson was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison, followed by three years of supervised release. The following month, Gilbert was sentenced to five years and Roberson was sentenced to "two-and-a-half years in prison, followed by one year of supervised release", and each was also fined, pursuant to July 2018 convictions on "six criminal charges each relating to a scheme intended to stop expansion of a toxic cleanup site in Jefferson County by the

", by bribing Robinson, using his

nonprofit organization A nonprofit organization (NPO) or non-profit organisation, also known as a non-business entity, not-for-profit organization, or nonprofit institution, is a legal entity organized and operated for a collective, public or social benefit, in co ...

, The Oliver Robinson Foundation.Hrynkiw, Ivana
"Former Drummond V.P. and Balch lawyer sentenced to federal prison", AL.com, Advance Local Media LLC., October 23, 2018. Retrieved October 27, 2018.

References

External links

Alabama House of Representatives bioAlabama Sports Hall of Fame bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Robinson, Oliver 1960 births Living people 21st-century American politicians African-American basketball players American men's basketball players Basketball players from Birmingham, Alabama Alabama politicians convicted of crimes Democratic Party members of the Alabama House of Representatives Ohio Mixers players San Antonio Spurs draft picks San Antonio Spurs players Sarasota Stingers players Shooting guards UAB Blazers men's basketball players 21st-century African-American politicians 20th-century African-American sportspeople