For a guy who said he was too old and feeble to go to prison, David Hileman certainly hasn't let age or poor health interfere with his golf game.

Mr. Hileman, 75, former head of construction planning at Mercy Hospital, pleaded guilty in March to accepting kickbacks from a contractor in exchange for padding construction bills that cost Mercy millions.

But he tried to avoid jail altogether in part by claiming that his health was failing and that he had to care for his girlfriend, who has breast cancer.

His conduct at Pike Run Country Club undercut his argument.

Subpoenaed records show Mr. Hileman spent much of 2005 golfing and shooting skeet at the club, where his expenses were among the many bribes he accepted from Susan and Tom Burtoft, former owners of LaMarca Corp. of Monroeville.

Yesterday, U.S. District Judge Terrence McVerry rejected his motion for leniency and sentenced him to 37 months in federal prison. The judge also ordered him to pay $4.3 million in restitution to Mercy.

Judge McVerry said he was not unsympathetic to Mr. Hileman's health or family problems, but he said most white-collar criminals can make similar claims. He said prison was justified.

Assistant U.S. Attorney James Garrett thought so, too.

In the first three quarters of 2005, according to records he introduced, Mr. Hileman spent $5,000 on activities at Pike Run.

The activity first came to light when a member of the club called the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette several times in the summer to complain that Mr. Hileman was playing golf in the 90-degree heat while claiming to be impaired by diabetes, high blood pressure, prostate problems and even "rotator cuff tendinitis."

Prosecutors checked into it and discovered that Mr. Hileman visited the club almost daily. In July, for example, records indicate he golfed 14 times and went shooting 11 times, often with guests, in addition to visiting the pool and having dinner.

Garrett said it was certainly his right to enjoy recreation while awaiting his fate.

"But to the extent that he has suggested or implied to the court that he lives a modest lifestyle due to limited financial circumstances, physical limitations, or the health problems of his partner," he wrote, "these records contradict that proposition."

Mr. Hileman was one of four insiders at Mercy, UPMC Shadyside and Allegheny Power in Greensburg who accepted lavish bribes from the Burtofts in exchange for approving phony bills, according to a long-running investigation by U.S. postal inspectors and the Criminal Investigation Division of the IRS.

The Burtofts, formerly of Murrysville, admitted to paying off Hileman and the others with cash, cars, expensive guns, vacation property and remodeling work.

In his case, Mr. Hileman took in more than $600,000 in bribes and secretly billed the hospital for a house in Edgewood.

Although he tried to argue that the Burtofts used him as a dupe in the scheme, a search of his house turned up handwritten instructions in which he described how best to conduct the fraud.

Garrett said Mr. Hileman was motivated by greed, which he said escalated during the years of the scheme. Not content with the house the Burtofts bought for him in 1994, which was ultimately paid for by overbilling the hospital, Mr. Hileman had their employees build a two-car, heated garage on the property.

And when Mr. Hileman's girlfriend was arrested for drunk driving in Ohio, Garrett said, he had the Burtofts pay for her lawyer, and later for $28,000 worth of remodeling on her house.

In addition to Mr. Hileman, the other big players prosecuted in the scheme are Jeffrey L. Davidson, former head of maintenance construction at Mercy; Demaree Hite, former head of construction at UPMC Shadyside; and Brian Ramsey, a former manager in the building services department at Allegheny Power.

Davidson and Hite pleaded guilty. Ramsey's case is pending.