6:30 p.m. Update - CAMDEN – Cooperation paid off for a former Pleasantville school board president who pleaded guilty in scheme to sell votes on district contracts.

James Pressley, 23, was sentenced to 24 months in federal prison this afternoon for accepting $40,800 in bribes in exchange for an insurance contract. That’s more than a year less than co-conspirator Rafael Velez received at his sentencing this morning. Velez admitted to accepting $4,000 in bribes.

U.S. District Judge Jerome B. Simandle said Pressley deserved less time than the federal guidelines allowed because of his crucial help with the government’s case. The term he could have been sentenced to was between 46 and 57 months.

Pressley has cooperated with the government since he was first approached in August 2007, a month before he and 11 other men were arrested in the scheme. Five of the conspirators were Pleasantville board members who had created a voting majority on the nine-member board to allow them to push through contracts for those who paid them. More