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RALEIGH (AP) - A former North Carolina environmental official was sentenced Wednesday to a little more than three years in prison for agreeing to take money in exchange for helping a proposed Beaufort County ethanol plant quickly gain a state air quality permit.

Boyce Allen Hudson, 67, a former senior government affairs employee for the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, pleaded guilty in May to extortion and money laundering charges.

In addition to the 40-month sentence, Hudson was ordered to pay $50,000 - $15,000 of which to reimburse the FBI for money given to him as part of a sting operation involving an undercover agent.

"This type of corruption is invidious," U.S. Attorney George Holding said after the sentencing, adding that such crimes go "right down to the retail level where the people are dealing with the government."

Hudson acknowledged reaching a deal with Agri-Ethanol Products LLC, which wanted to build a $220 million plant that would blend ethanol distilled from agricultural crops.

Prosecutors said Hudson was to receive nearly $200,000 in cash and consulting fees if he got the plant's air permit approved within 90 days. Hudson used his influence to get it completed it 29 days in December 2004, according to the government, but only received $20,000, with $15,000 of it coming from the undercover agent posing as an investor.

At the sentencing hearing, U.S. District Court Judge Terrence Boyle declined to reduce Hudson's active prison time markedly below the guidelines of roughly 3½ years to 4¼ years.

Federal prosecutors had recommended a 25 percent reduction. They said Hudson cooperated in the ongoing investigation through interviews, wearing a wire to record 10 in-person conversations and having his phone calls monitored.

Hudson's attorneys argued he made one stupid mistake in search of financial security following his 2005 retirement, which followed a lifetime of public service and commitment to the environment. Boyle received letters from Hudson's family and friends seeking leniency.

"He violated public trust and did a very bad thing," Douglas Parsons, one of Hudson's attorneys, told Boyle, but "he also began to repay his debt to the state of North Carolina and the people of the United States."

But Boyle wasn't persuaded to reward Hudson after Bruce said no additional indictments had resulted from Hudson's assistance. Holding declined to comment on the status of the investigation, saying it was ongoing.

Hudson will remain free until reporting to prison, which he must do by Nov. 1. He didn't make a statement in court and declined to comment after the hearing.

According to prosecutors, two investors in Agri-Ethanol Products contacted Hudson in mid-2004 and discussed potential permit issues with him. Hudson was later asked to meet with the company's chief executive, identified in court as David Brady. That's when the agreement was reached, prosecutors said.

Brady hasn't been charged with a crime. A telephone number for Agri-Ethanol Products LLC is no longer in service. Messages left at a residential telephone listing for Brady and the firm's registered agent weren't immediately returned Wednesday.

Although Hudson did not issue the permits, he used his influence to ensure there were no delays by traveling to visit an unidentified official at the Washington, N.C., office of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, according to court documents.

Hudson falsely told the official that lawmakers were interested in the project moving forward and that "the official needed to expedite the permit process," Bruce wrote.

Investigators got wind of the case when company executives bragged about how a state official had helped the company get the permit. The state environment department has questioned if Hudson did anything to accelerate a permit application process that normally takes about a month.

The ethanol plant project never got off the ground due to a lack of investment.