Washington, D.C. ? A federal judge sentenced a former Bush administration official to 18 months in prison in the Jack Abramoff lobbying case Friday.

David Safavian, the former chief of staff for the General Services Administration, was sentenced on obstruction and concealment charges for lying to investigators about his relationship with Abramoff.

Safavian wept in court as he asked for leniency, but U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman said the ex-bureaucrat had become part of Washington’s culture of corruption, where congressmen listen to campaign donors and lobbyists while farming out to staff members the job of writing laws.