[1] Hamilton was convicted and sentenced by a U.S. district court jury to 9 1/2 years in prison for federal bribery and extortion charges in August 2011 for soliciting employees of Old Dominion University for a paid position in exchange for a legislative budget amendment that included funding for the position.

[3] In August 2009 Virginia newspapers obtained emails which revealed Hamilton expected to be hired by Old Dominion University (ODU) in return for procuring public funding for a new teacher training center.

Regarding ODU, the audit concluded the school suffered from a lack of internal control and failed to follow its own policies and procedures.

[5] Hamilton was sentenced on August 12, 2011 to 9 1/2 years in prison by a U.S. district jury after a conviction in May of one count of federal program bribery and one count of extortion under color of official right for what was found to be criminal solicitation of Old Dominion University employees for the ODU contractor position, a coerced quid pro quo for a legislative budget amendment to fund the position and the training center that Hamilton had introduced in the Virginia legislature.

The Court ordered him to surrender to authorities by September 19, 2011 and to serve two additional years of supervised release following his 114-month prison term.

In August 2016, he and former Democratic Congressmen Chaka Fattah of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania became two of the first people convicted of public corruption to try to take advantage of the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in the case involving former Republican Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell.