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Danish company pays approximately $33 million to resolve bribery allegations
Hempel, a Danish company that makes protective coatings used in maritime environments, announced on March 4 that it had settled bribery allegations with the Danish State Prosecutor for Serious and International Crime by paying a $33 million fine. The company self-reported what it called “illegal sales practices found in Germany, other countries in Europe, and in Asia” in April 2017.
CFTC adds self-reporting of foreign corrupt practices by non-registrants to cooperation program
On March 6, the CFTC issued an enforcement advisory announcing that it would add violations of the Commodity Exchange Act involving foreign corrupt practices to its cooperation and self-reporting program. The CFTC will recommend no civil monetary penalty where companies and individuals which are not registered (or required to be registered) with the CFTC timely and voluntarily disclose such violations. Full cooperation and appropriate remediation would also be required. In announcing the enforcement advisory, the CFTC’s Director of Enforcement stated at the ABA’s National Institute on White Collar Crime that the change “reflects the enhanced cooperation between the CFTC and our law enforcement partners like the Department of Justice.” He also stated that the agency currently has open investigations into various foreign corrupt practices that violate the Commodity Exchange Act, including bribes that “secure business in connection with regulated activities,” manipulation of benchmarks, “prices that are the product of corruption [being] falsely reported to benchmarks,” and corrupt practices altering the commodity markets.
DOJ charges two more businessmen with bribery in connection with Venezuelan bribery scheme
In an indictment unsealed on February 26, the DOJ charged a former sales representative and the president of a U.S.-based company with conspiracy to commit bribery, wire fraud, and money laundering, and substantive wire fraud, for their alleged roles in “a scheme to corruptly secure business advantages, including contracts and payment on past due invoices, from Venezuela’s state-owned and state-controlled energy company, Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA).” The indictment alleges that from approximately 2009 to 2013, the sales representative, Rafael Enrique Pinto Franceschi, and the president of the company, Franz Herman Muller Huber, conspired to bribe three PDVSA officials in exchange for providing advantages to the unnamed company, including through the creation of fictitious invoices from Panamanian shell companies.
According to the indictment, in exchange for the bribes the PDVSA officials allegedly assisted the company in obtaining additional PDVSA contracts, inside information, and payment on past due invoices. The defendants are also alleged to have received kickbacks in connection with the scheme. In total, Pinto is alleged to have received over $985,000 and Muller over $258,000 in kickback payments. Two of the three officials that the defendants are accused of bribing have pleaded guilty in connection with the case and are pending sentencing.
Technip sets aside $280 million for bribery settlements with multiple countries
On February 20, TechnipFMC, a London-based oil and gas services company, reported in a filing with the SEC that it has set aside $280 million as an estimate for the settlement of investigations by U.S., Brazilian, and French law enforcement authorities regarding potential violations of anticorruption laws in several countries. The company’s predecessor, Technip SA, previously paid $338 million to settle FCPA charges brought by the DOJ and the SEC in 2010.
SFO declines to prosecute individuals in Rolls-Royce and GSK corruption investigations
The U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO) announced on February 22 that it was ending two long-running corruption-related investigations – one of aviation company Rolls-Royce and the other of pharmaceutical giant GlaxoSmithKline – without bringing charges against any individuals.
In 2017, Rolls-Royce paid $650 million to settle an SFO investigation into a government kickbacks scheme. In connection with the resolution of the SFO’s charges, Rolls-Royce admitted to bribing government officials in Russia, India, China, Nigeria, and elsewhere in exchange for contracts worth hundreds of millions of pounds. Rolls-Royce also paid $170 million to resolve related charges brought by the DOJ, with the DOJ later charging five individuals for their alleged participation in the bribery scheme.
Although the SFO announced in 2014 that GlaxoSmithKline was under investigation, the SFO never disclosed the subject matter of that investigation. In its only announcements about the case, the SFO has noted simply that the investigation concerned the company’s “commercial practices.” In 2012, GlaxoSmithKline had paid $3 billion in the U.S. to settle charges brought by U.S. prosecutors concerning alleged off-label marketing, and in 2014 was convicted in China of bribing doctors and hospitals to improve sales, but it remains unknown whether the SFO’s investigation related to one of these known issues or something different.
The SFO Director explained in a public statement that the decision to decline prosecution of any individuals in connection with these investigations was because “there is either insufficient evidence to provide a realistic prospect of conviction, or it is not in the public interest to bring a prosecution in these cases.”
Cognizant resolves FCPA investigations
On February 15, Cognizant Technology Solutions Corporation, an information technology and business process outsourcing company, paid $25 million to settle SEC civil charges that it violated the FCPA. The SEC alleged that Cognizant paid $3.6 million in bribes through its construction contractor to senior government officials in India in order to obtain permits needed to build, among other things, a large office campus in Chennai. The SEC alleged that by paying the bribes, Cognizant thereby avoided millions of dollars in costs it would have otherwise incurred. To resolve the SEC’s allegations, Cognizant paid $19 million in disgorgement and a $6 million penalty.
The DOJ declined to bring criminal charges against Cognizant, citing, among other factors, the company’s voluntary self-disclosure, comprehensive investigation, full cooperation and remediation, and its preexisting compliance program. Cognizant issued a statement highlighting that the matter did not concern any of the company’s work with clients and did not affect any of the services it provides to clients.
On the same day the settlement was announced, two former Cognizant executives – the president and chief legal officer – were hit with civil and criminal charges for allegedly authorizing $2 million in bribes and directing the creation of false contractor change orders to mask payment of the bribes. The former executives are charged with violating the anti-bribery, books and records, and internal accounting controls provisions of the FCPA. Pursuant to its letter agreement with DOJ, Cognizant is required to fully cooperate in the ongoing prosecutions.
Micronesian official charged with money laundering conspiracy after guilty plea to bribery by Hawaiian executive
On February 11, the Department of Justice (DOJ) unsealed conspiracy to commit money laundering charges against a Micronesian government official alleged to have taken bribes to secure engineering and project management contracts from the government of the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM). The charges follow the recent guilty plea by Frank James Lyon, a Hawaiian executive, to a charge of conspiracy to bribe the Micronesian official in violation of the FCPA.
According to the DOJ, Master Halbert was a government official in the FSM Department of Transportation, Communications and Infrastructure who administered FSM’s aviation programs. Between 2006 and 2016, Lyon’s Hawaii-based engineering and consulting company allegedly paid around $440,000 in bribes in the form of cash, vehicles, and entertainment to FSM officials, including Halbert, to obtain and retain contracts with the FSM government valued at nearly $8 million. The complaint unsealed on Monday contains specific examples of requests by Halbert to Lyon for cash gifts and a 2014 Chevy Silverado. According to Lyon’s guilty plea, he fulfilled Halbert’s requests and sent wire transfers and the automobile internationally for Halbert’s personal use.
Former Petrofac oil-services sales executive pleads guilty in U.K. to bribery charges
On February 6, the U.K. SFO announced that a former sales executive, David Lufkin, of an oil-services company, Petrofac PLC, had pleaded guilty in the U.K. to 11 counts of bribery regarding payments made in exchange for winning oil-services contracts in Iraq and Saudi Arabia. Lufkin – a British citizen and the former global head of sales for a subsidiary of Petrofac – pleaded guilty to participating in payments of more than $6 million to agents to win contracts worth more than $4 billion in Iraq and Saudi Arabia. The SFO’s investigation of Petrofac regarding suspected bribery and money laundering, which was announced in May 2017, is ongoing, but no other officers or employees are currently charged.
Former insurance executives charged with laundering bribes to Barbados Minister of Industry
On January 28, DOJ announced charges against the former chief executive and a former senior vice president of a Barbados-based insurance company, Insurance Corporation of Barbados Limited (ICBL). The indictment alleges that the ICBL executives, Ingrid Innes and Alex Tasker, participated in a scheme to launder approximately $36,000 in bribes to the then-Minister of Industry of Barbados in exchange for his assistance in securing government contracts for ICBL. According to the indictment, the bribes were laundered through a United States bank account in the name of a dental company located in New York. The former Minister of Industry, Donville Inniss, was arrested in August 2018 and the indictment against him referenced, but did not name, his alleged co-conspirators. The superseding indictment against the three co-defendants and another still unnamed former insurance executive was unsealed on January 18, 2019. Prior Scorecard coverage of the arrest and indictment of the former Minister of Industry can be found here.
ICBL voluntarily self-disclosed the case to DOJ and received a declination letter from DOJ for its cooperation pursuant to the FCPA Corporate Enforcement Policy. The declination letter required ICBL to disgorge $93,940.19 in profits received through the conduct at issue. The declination was based, in part, on ICBL’s termination of all executives and employees involved in the alleged misconduct and in helping DOJ identify the culpable individuals. Prior Scorecard coverage of the declination letter can be found here.
Four receive suspended sentences in SFO’s F.H. Bertling North Sea case
On January 11, the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO) announced that four more individuals were sentenced in connection with a bribery scheme involving an F.H. Bertling Ltd. oil exploration project in the North Sea. Three of the individuals—one former agent of ConocoPhillips and two former F.H. Bertling directors—pleaded guilty prior to the trial. They received 6, 12, and 15 month prison sentences, although their terms are suspended for two years. The two former directors were also ordered to pay fines of £15,000 and £20,000. The fourth individual, F.H. Bertling’s former chief commercial officer, was convicted at trial. He received 9 months’ imprisonment (also suspended for two years), and was ordered to pay a £5,000 fine.
Several of the defendants also received suspended prison terms related to SFO’s F.H. Bertling Angola case. See previous FCPA Scorecard coverage of the probes here and here.