Bribery and Bid-Rigging

May 15, 2019

Robert C. Leonard, CEO of Force Multiplier Solutions, has been ordered to pay $125 million in restitution for his part in a bribery scheme which took down public officials and brought about the collapse of Dallas County Schools. Mr. Leonard pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit honest services wire fraud and was sentenced to seven years in federal prison.  DOJ

May 1, 2019

Michael S. Flynn of Bridgeport, Connecticut, pleaded guilty to charges arising from his role in rigging bids on contracts to install insulation at construction projects for universities, hospitals, and other public and private entities in Connecticut, New York, and Massachusetts.  Flynn owned and ran an insulation contractor, an conspired with competitors to fix prices and submit bids that inflated customer costs by at least 10%, costing victims more than $45 million in total.  Flynn faces up to 30 years in prison.  DOJ

May 1, 2019

An Alaska Native Corporation that qualified for the Small Business Administration’s set aside contracts has agreed to pay $2 million to settle a whistleblower’s allegations that it paid kickbacks to obtain said contracts.  According to a qui tam complaint by Susann Campbell, Kikiktagruk Inupiat Corporation (KIC), and its subsidiary, KIC Development LLC (KICD), paid bribes to a contract employee with the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers in order to obtain preferential treatment and confidential government information to ensure it won a construction contract at the military’s Ft. Bliss installation in Texas.  USAO WDTX

April 22, 2019

Three Michigan construction firms will pay $466,500 to resolve claims of bid rigging and fraudulent billing for renovation work performed at Amtrak stations for the National Railroad Passenger Corporation.   Tooles Contracting Group, LLC, Commercial Contracting Corporation, and G&B Electric, Inc., along with G&B's president James Gierlach, were alleged to have unlawfully shared bid information and inflated invoices and time records.  USAO ED MI

Hyundai Oilbank Co., S-Oil Corporation, et al — Government Contract Fraud/Bid-Rigging ($363 million)

A team of our whistleblower attorneys led the representation of an anonymous whistleblower who provided extensive assistance to the U.S. government in its criminal and civil cases against several Korean oil and transportation companies, for their roles in a conspiracy to artificially inflate prices on fuel contracts for U.S. military bases in South Korea. Ultimately, five different entities paid a total of $363 million in the largest False Claims Act antitrust recovery as well as the largest False Claims Act settlement involving bid-rigging to date. In November 2018, SK Energy Co. Ltd., GS Caltex Corporation, and Hanjin Transportation Co. Ltd. collectively agreed to pay $154 million, to resolve civil claims, and an additional $82 million in criminal fines for their involvement in the conspiracy the whistleblower exposed. And in March 2019, the Department of Justice announced that two additional companies, Hyundai Oilbank Co. Ltd and S-Oil Corporation, would pay $75 million in criminal fines and $52 million to resolve these same False Claims Act and antitrust violations. The whistleblower received an award of nearly $37 million, representing 23% of the False Claims Act payments. Read more here, here, and here.

April 3, 2019

Sandra Ruballo and Carlos Andres Montoya were found guilty of wire-fraud, bribery, and money laundering for their role in a multi-million dollar scheme to defraud the Child Care Food Program, a federally funded food program for underprivileged children in South Florida daycare centers. The conspirators drafted fake paperwork, entered into kickback arrangements, rigged the catering bidding process and inflated annual budgets in order to secure federal funds for their own personal benefit. Ruballo is scheduled to be sentenced on May 8, 2019. Montoya is scheduled to be sentenced on June 5, 2019. Each defendant faces a maximum statutory sentence of 20 years’ imprisonment. DOJ

March 20, 2019

South Korean companies Hyundai Oilbank Co. Ltd. and S-Oil Corporation will plead guilty and pay $127 million in fines to resolve criminal and civil claims arising from the defendants’ alleged bid-rigging and price-fixing in contracts to supply fuel to U.S. military bases in South Korea.  The settlement, the second announced by DOJ in an ongoing investigation, resolves criminal conspiracy and antitrust claims, as well as civil antitrust and False Claims Act violations related to the bid-rigging conspiracy. DOJ