FCPA Scorecard Blog

UK court convicts former Alstom executive

On December 19, a UK Court found former Alstom Power Ltd. Global Sales Director Nicholas Reynolds guilty of conspiracy to corrupt in connection with his role in bribing Lithuanian officials to win lucrative power station contracts for the French power and transportation company. Mr. Reynolds will be sentenced on December 21.

The conviction follows the guilty pleas of Alstom and two other individuals in the UK in connection with the company’s Lithuanian bribery scheme. According to the SFO, Alstom companies paid Lithuanian politicians more than €5 million (~$6.3 million in today’s USD) in bribes to secure the contracts, valued at €240 million (~$304 million in today’s USD). The SFO also has charged Alstom and former Alstom executives for alleged corruption spanning Hungary, India, Poland, and Tunisia.

In late 2014, Alstom and various subsidiaries agreed to pay a then-record $772 million fine in connection with FCPA violations spanning numerous countries. For prior FCPA Scorecard coverage of Alstom, please see here.

FCPA Bribery Anti-Corruption

NY-based financial institution and various individuals charged in Malaysia

On December 17 and 19, press reports indicate Malaysian prosecutors filed criminal charges against a New York-based financial institution and numerous individuals, including former executives of the financial institution, in connection with their alleged roles in a multi-billion bribery and money laundering scheme involving Malaysia sovereign wealth fund 1Malaysia Development Berhad (1MDB). 

Malaysian prosecutors charged the financial institution with making false and misleading statements when raising money for 1MDB. Among individuals, Tim Leissner, a former participating managing director of the financial institution, and Ng Chong Hwa (also known as Roger Ng), a former managing director, also were charged. These charges follow the U.S. government’s investigation and charges related to the same 1MDB scheme.

As detailed in prior FCPA Scorecard coverage, Leissner pleaded guilty in November to Conspiracy to Violate the FCPA and Conspiracy to Commit Money Laundering and agreed to forfeit $43.7 million. The DOJ charged NG with similar offenses and, according to press reports, is fighting extradition to the United States.

According to press reports, in response to the filing of the criminal charges in Malaysia, the financial institution stated: “Under the Malaysian legal process, the firm was not afforded an opportunity to be heard prior to the filing of these charges against certain Goldman Sachs entities, which we intend to vigorously contest. These charges do not affect our ability to conduct our current business globally.” 

The DOJ has not charged or reached a resolution with the financial institution, which previously announced that it was cooperating with the DOJ’s and all regulators’ investigations. The announcement of the Malaysian charges suggests that the U.S. DOJ and Malaysian prosecutors may not be coordinating efforts.

FCPA Enforcement Action FCPA DOJ Anti-Money Laundering

SEC charges former senior executives of Panasonic Avionics

On December 18, the former CEO and CFO of U.S.-based Panasonic Avionics Corporation (PAC) settled SEC charges that they knowingly violated books and records and internal accounting controls provisions of the federal securities laws and caused similar violations by PAC’s parent company, Osaka, Japan-based Panasonic Corp. (Panasonic). As detailed in prior FCPA Scorecard coverage, Panasonic and PAC settled related FCPA charges in April and agreed to pay a combined $280 million to the DOJ and SEC.

PAC’s former President and CEO, Paul A. Margis, and its former CFO, Takeshi “Tyrone” Uonaga, consented to the entry of their administrative orders without admitting or denying the findings and agreed to pay penalties of $75,000, and $50,000, respectively.

The SEC alleged Mr. Margis authorized the use of a third-party to pay more than $1.76 million to several consultants who provided little to no services. One of these consultants, a Middle East government official, was paid $875,000 to help secure over $700 million in business from a state-owned airline, but the position “required little to no work.” The bribery scheme involving this foreign official was previously described in the DPA with DOJ and the SEC Settlement Order. Mr. Margis was also charged with making false representations to PAC’s auditor regarding internal accounting controls, and books and records.

The SEC charged Mr. Uonaga in connection with a backdating scheme that resulted in Panasonic improperly recording $82 million in revenue. Mr. Uonaga was charged with making false representations to PAC’s auditor regarding the company’s financial statements, internal accounting controls, and books and records. The order against Mr. Uonaga suspends him from appearing or practicing before the Commission as an accountant for at least five years.

Mr. Margis and Mr. Uonaga were previously described in the SEC Settlement Order as PAC Executive 1 and PAC Executive 2, respectively. The DOJ has not brought any criminal charges against any individuals in this matter.

SEC DPA

OECD study finds that government officials punished in only one-fifth of bribery cases

On December 11, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published a study examining the consequences faced by public officials who allegedly accepted bribes. The study analyzed 55 foreign-bribery cases concluded between 2008 and 2013 in which companies based in OECD countries had been sanctioned for bribery. It found that government officials were criminally sanctioned in only one-fifth of the 55 cases studied. An additional 11 actions were still pending at either the investigative or prosecutorial stages. The study also found that none of the countries in which bribes were paid, the demand-side countries, detected that their public officials demanded a bribe. Instead, the study found that the “media plays a major role in international information flow.”

International Bribery

Former officer of Venezuela oil company pleads guilty to obstruction

On December 10, a former procurement officer of Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA), Venezuela’s state-owned and state-controlled energy company, pleaded guilty to one count of obstructing an investigation into bribes paid by the owner of U.S.-based companies to Venezuelan government officials in exchange for securing additional business with PDVSA and payment priority on outstanding issues. Alfonso Eliezer Gravina Munoz (Gravina), who previously worked for PDVSA in Houston, Texas, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to obstruct an official proceeding. 

The charge stems from a guilty plea Gravina entered on December 10, 2015, to one count of conspiracy to launder money and one count of making false statements on his federal income tax return. Under the terms of a plea agreement in that case, Gravina agreed to cooperate with the investigation by being interviewed by the United States, and to providing “truthful, complete and accurate information” to government agents and attorneys. In the latest plea, though, Gravina admitted that after his earlier plea, he concealed facts about bribes paid to PDVSA by a target of the investigation, referred to as Co-Conspirator 1 in the indictment. Additionally, Gravina informed Co-Conspirator 1 that U.S. government authorities were investigating Co-Conspirator 1, and provided Co-Conspirator 1 with information about the investigation, including the topics discussed in Gravina’s meetings with the government. Consequently, Co-Conspirator 1 destroyed evidence and attempted to flee the country in July 2018. Gravina is scheduled to be sentenced on Feb. 19, 2019.

Bribery Anti-Money Laundering

U.S.-based agriculture company discloses investigation

On November 30, a U.S.-based agriculture company, CHS Inc., disclosed in an SEC filing that it is cooperating with an investigation being conducted by the SEC and DOJ involving payments made to Mexican customs officials. The payments were made in connection with grain shipments crossing the U.S.-Mexican border by train. CHS Inc. is a Fortune 100 company that is owned primarily by farmer and rancher cooperatives and has extensive operations in the energy sector in addition to agriculture. 

The SEC filing states that the company voluntarily self-disclosed the potential violations and stressed the company’s full cooperation with the investigation, which includes “investigating other areas of potential interest to the government.” The DOJ has placed great emphasis on the importance of voluntary self-disclosure and cooperation in recent policy statements. See previous Scorecard coverage here. This investigation is noteworthy because while investigations in the energy sector are common, investigations in the agricultural sector are less so. The eventual resolution of this investigation may provide useful guidance for other agribusiness companies. 

DOJ SEC

UK Serious Fraud Office ends first deferred prosecution agreement with Standard Bank

On November 30, the United Kingdom’s Serious Fraud Office (SFO) announced the successful conclusion of the deferred prosecution agreement entered into in 2015 with Standard Bank PLC, which had followed allegations that payments were made by two former employees to bribe members of the Tanzanian government. This deferred prosecution agreement was the first ever entered into by the SFO and also marked the first use of Section 7 of the Bribery Act of 2010—failure of commercial organizations to prevent bribery—by any U.K. prosecutor. Upon entering into the deferred prosecution agreement in 2015, Standard Bank had also settled related charges with the SEC. See previous Scorecard coverage here.

The DPA required Standard Bank to pay fines and disgorgement totaling almost $26 million, pay an additional $6 million to compensate the government of Tanzania, and hire an external compliance consultant. On the basis that Standard Bank had fully complied with the terms of the agreement, the SFO announced that it had advised the relevant UK court that it will conclude the DPA without restarting proceedings against the bank. The SFO’s announcement also promised that a “Details of Compliance” document outlining how Standard Bank met the terms of the deferred prosecution agreement would be published on the SFO’s website in the future. Because this is the SFO’s first deferred prosecution agreement, this document could be very useful guidance for companies to understand what measures will be expected to satisfy the SFO.

UK Serious Fraud Office DPA

Buckley Sandler Special Alert: DOJ announces new policy on pursuing individuals in corporate resolutions

U.S. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein said at a conference this morning that the U.S. Department of Justice has revised its guidelines relating to corporate resolutions with the DOJ, particularly as those guidelines relate to charging culpable individuals. The revised guidelines modify the 2015 Yates Memo, and affirmatively obligate companies seeking leniency from the DOJ to investigate and furnish information about culpable employees and agents substantially involved in wrongdoing.

Corporations now will receive cooperation credit in criminal resolutions only if all employees substantially involved in the alleged wrongdoing are identified to the government. And in civil resolutions, corporations will receive cooperation credit only if the corporation reveals the involvement of senior management and board members in the alleged wrongdoing. The new policy highlights the DOJ’s ongoing focus on criminal and civil enforcement actions against individuals and emphasizes the importance of giving serious consideration to obtaining individual counsel very early in the process of an investigation.

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Click here to read the full special alert.

If you have questions about the DOJ’s new policy or other related issues, please visit our White Collar practice page or contact one of Buckley Sandler’s 15 partners in that practice.

DOJ FCPA

SEC settles with Texas offshore drilling company for violations of FCPA internal controls provision

On November 19, the SEC announced a settlement with Vantage Drilling International (“Vantage”) based on the improper activities of Vantage’s predecessor, Vantage Drilling Company, in connection with the Petrobras bribery scheme. The Administrative Order found that Vantage Drilling Company had “failed to devise a system of internal accounting controls with regard to [its] transactions with [its] former outside director, largest shareholder, and only supplier of drilling assets . . . and failed to properly implement internal accounting controls related to its use of third-party marketing agents,” noting the company’s “ineffective anticorruption compliance program.” According to the Order, these failures permitted payments that “created a risk that [it] was providing or reimbursing funds that [a director] intended to use to make improper payments to [Petrobras],” a Brazilian company at the center of a massive FCPA scheme.

The settlement with the SEC concludes Vantage’s involvement in the Petrobras investigations. According to Vantage, the company received a cooperation letter from the DOJ last year confirming Vantage’s full cooperation in the Petrobras investigation, and that the DOJ would not move forward with any actions against Vantage.

Further coverage of the Petrobras matter is available here.

DOJ Bribery SEC

Co-conspirators sentenced in Venezuelan bribery scheme involving Venezuelan TV mogul

Two co-conspirators of billionaire news network Globovision owner Raul Gorrin Belisario were sentenced this week as part of the DOJ’s recently unsealed prosecution of a bribery scheme involving over $1 billion paid in bribes to members of the Venezuelan government. According to the DOJ, Gorrin was indicted under seal in August for conspiracy to violate the FCPA, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and nine counts of money laundering. Two co-conspirators, Florida resident and former Venezuelan National Treasurer Alejandro Andrade Cedeno, and Chicago resident and former owner of Banco Peravia Gabriel Arturo Jimenez Aray, each pleaded guilty under seal to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, and were sentenced in federal court earlier this week.

According to Gorrin’s indictment, he allegedly bribed members of the Venezuelan government—including Andrade—in exchange for the right to handle the government’s foreign currency exchange transactions, and then acquired a bank in order to launder the bribe money and other illicit proceeds. To do so, Gorrin allegedly moved money from Switzerland to accounts in Florida and New York and used it to purchase luxury items such as “jets, a yacht, multiple champion horses, and numerous high-end watches.”

In December 2017, Andrade pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, admitting to taking bribes in exchange for helping his co-conspirators—including Gorrin—by choosing them to conduct currency exchanges at favorable rates to the Venezuelan government. As part of his plea, Andrade agreed to cooperate and pay a forfeiture money judgment of $1 billion through the forfeiture of “real estate, vehicles, horses, watches, aircraft, and bank accounts.” On November 27, 2018, U.S. Southern District of Florida Judge Robin L. Rosenberg sentenced Andrade to 10 years in prison, the maximum under his plea deal.

In March 2018, Chicago resident and former owner of Banco Peravia Gabriel Arturo Jimenez Aray took a similar plea deal, pleading guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, admitting to helping Gorrin and others acquire and then launder money through Banco Peravia.  On November 29, 2018, Jimenez was sentenced to 3 years in prison.

The Miami Herald has also reported that Gorrin’s personal banker is Matthias Krull, formerly of Julius Baer Panama, who was sentenced last month for his role in another money laundering scheme involving Venezuela’s Petroleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA). Coverage of the PDVSA prosecutions is available here.

DOJ Anti-Money Laundering Bribery