The Rev. Raleigh Trammell, the former head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference sentenced to 18 months in prison, will be freed, at least temporarily, under an appeals court decision handed down Thursday.

Ohio 2nd District Court of Appeals Judges Mike Fain and Jeffrey Froelich agreed to stay his sentence while he appeals his verdict. Under the court order, Trammell must post a $10,000 surety bond or $1,000 in cash and comply with the bond conditions he was under while awaiting trial and sentencing.

Trammell, 74, was convicted June 1 on 51 felony counts related to a home-delivered meals service run from the headquarters of the SCLC Dayton chapter, though several of those counts merged for the purposes of sentencing.

His sentencing was delayed several times, but he entered prison on Sept. 12, according to the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction.

In addition to the prison sentence, Montgomery County Common Pleas Judge Michael L. Tucker ordered Trammell to pay $38,000 in restitution to the county.

Prosecutors contended that the county reimbursed $38,000 to the SCLC for 7,000 meals that were not delivered between 2005 and early 2010. Two of the people whom Trammell claimed to feed were dead, two had never heard of his program and three were in long-term care facilities and not receiving extra meals, according to prosecutors.

Trammell’s defense attorneys maintain that Trammell, and the rest of the Dayton chapter of the SCLC, were guilty of nothing more than accounting errors.

A Montgomery County grand jury indicted Trammell on the charges after a Dayton Daily News investigation found that Trammell’s program claimed to be providing meals to people who weren’t being served, including Oscar Davis, a trustee of Trammell’s church who was living at the Dayton Veterans Affairs Medical Center nursing home, and Davis’ hospitalized wife.