(Bloomberg) -- Former Goldman Sachs Group Inc. investment banker Brijesh Goel should serve more than three years in prison for sharing confidential deal information with a friend who traded on it, federal prosecutors said.

The Manhattan US attorney’s office on Wednesday recommended a term at the low end of the 41-to-51 month guideline for the counts on which Goel, 39, was convicted in June. In addition, Goldman asked for Goel to cover $393,149 in costs it incurred cooperating with the prosecution.

The former Goldman vice president is due to be sentenced on Nov. 1 by US District Judge P. Kevin Castel, who is not bound by the government’s recommendation. Goel last week asked the judge to give him no jail time, arguing that immediate deportation to his native India would be punishment enough.

Prosecutors said prison time was warranted because of the “gratuitous nature” of Goel’s crime.

“This was not a crime of desperation or of necessity,” the government said. “The defendant, for example, did not need to steal to feed his family. Instead, this was a crime of hubris — a crime born out of a sense that one is above the rules that others have to play by, the sense that one will not, or cannot, get caught.”

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Goel passed tips to Akshay Niranjan, a Barclays Plc trader who had been a classmate at University of California, Berkeley’s business school. The details of their close relationship, including copious drug use, regular squash matches and music festivals, heightened the drama of Goel’s trial, where Niranjan was the prosecution’s star witness against his onetime friend. 

Niranjan recorded conversations in which Goel asked him to delete texts about his tips. The two made around $280,000 trading ahead of Goldman deals.

At trial, Goel tried to argue that he was set up by Niranjan. In his sentencing recommendation, Goel’s lawyers also argued that it was unfair that Niranjan, who was not charged, was facing no similar consequences, despite making most of the money from the scheme. 

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But prosecutors noted that Niranjan cooperated after being approached by law enforcement. while Goel sought to obstruct their investigation. “Any disparity between the outcome for the defendant and the outcome for Niranjan is a disparity of the defendant’s own making,” the government said.

Both Goel, who had moved from Goldman to a position at Apollo Global Management before his arrest, and Niranjan were let go from their positions after the case was announced.

Goldman submitted a victim impact statement that was filed with the government’s sentencing recommendation. The bank noted that it had incurred legal fees producing documents to the prosecutors, preparing witnesses to testify for the government and monitoring the trial.

The case is US v. Goel, 22-cr-00396, US District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan)

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