Heiress sentenced to almost seven years jail in Nxivm case

Clare Bronfman, heiress to the Seagram liquor fortune, was sentenced to nearly seven years in prison Wednesday -- more than the five-year sentence prosecutors had recommended.

Bronfman was remanded to custody shortly after the hearing. Her attorney told CNN she plans to appeal immediately.

Bronfman, 41, is the first member of Nxivm, a company that marketed self-improvement programs, to be sentenced in the federal case that resulted in the cult-like group's founder Keith Raniere being convicted of sex trafficking, racketeering, sexual exploitation of a child and human trafficking charges.

Bronfman has spent the last two years in home confinement and was seen entering federal court in Brooklyn wearing a dark floral mask and clutching the hand of one of her attorneys.

Bronfman was one of five co-conspirators indicted on racketeering charges in connection with Raniere's case, but her sentence was in connection with two charges she pleaded guilty to in April 2019 which included conspiracy to conceal and harbor people who were not in the US legally for financial gain, as well as fraudulent use of identification.

While Bronfman pleaded guilty to those two charges, she has said she was not aware of the allegations of abuse surrounding a secret, all-female group within Nxivm known as DOS.