Last Friday, former Camden Mayor Milton Milan was sentenced to more than seven years in federal prison on his corruption convictions. For once, his pomposity was missing at the sentencing hearing.

"People believed in me and trusted in me," said Milan in the courtroom. "I let them down."

Those four words illustrated that the once obliviously optimistic Milan finally had grasped reality. He had committed grave crimes against those he had sworn to serve. And he knew it.

For the next seven years, it'll be tough for him to forget that.