District Not Recorded

Attorney General Jeff Sessions today issued the following statement regarding Saturday’s fatal shooting in Louisiana:

“We are all saddened to learn of the death on Saturday night of Sergeant Shawn Anderson, who was shot and killed while trying to question a rape suspect. His death adds to the sorrow of the law enforcement community in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, which still mourns the killing last July of three officers during an ambush. The loss of Sergeant Anderson underscores the dangers that our men and women in law enforcement face willingly every day as they serve and protect us. We are forever in their debt, and we must do more to keep them safe. I will make available all of the resources of the department to aid the state and local authorities investigating this incident, and to ensure that the suspect who killed this brave officer faces justice. My thoughts and prayers, and those of the entire Department of Justice, go out to the family, loved ones, and colleagues of Sergeant Anderson.”

The Justice Department announced today that it has reached an agreement with the Pea Ridge School District (PRSD) of Pea Ridge, Arkansas, to remedy alleged violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Title II of the ADA prohibits discrimination by public entities, including school districts, against individuals who have disabilities; individuals regarded as having disabilities; and individuals associated with people with disabilities.

Based on its investigation, the Department previously issued a Letter of Findings outlining how the District excluded three students after reviewing a document referencing the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) status of the students’ family member. The District initially concluded that the students were not to be allowed back into the school district until they underwent HIV testing and the results were returned to the District. Following the students’ exclusion from school and extracurricular activities for multiple days, the District changed its position, readmitting the students prior to its receipt of their HIV test results.

The Settlement Agreement requires the District to adopt and implement a written non-discrimination policy that makes clear that PRSD does not discriminate on the basis of disability and that those individuals who are “regarded as disabled” or are associated with a person with a disability are covered by the ADA’s protections. PRSD has also agreed to revise its “Communicable Diseases and Parasites” policy to state that HIV is not considered to be a condition requiring a student’s exclusion from school under that policy; to provide ADA training to PRSD instructors and administrators; to report on its compliance with the agreement; and to pay $15,000 in compensatory damages.

“No child should be kept from attending school based on unfounded fears about HIV,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Tom Wheeler of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division. “We commend the Pea Ridge School District for its commitment, reflected in this agreement, to ensure the ADA’s nondiscrimination promise for all students.”

To read the Settlement Agreement or for more information on the ADA and HIV discrimination, visit www.ada.gov/hiv. For more information about the ADA, including how to file a complaint, call the Department’s toll-free ADA Information Line at 800-514-0301 (TDD 800-514-0383) or access the ADA website at www.ada.gov.

The Justice Department reached a settlement agreement today with Pizzerias, LLC (Pizzerias), a pizza restaurant franchisee with 31 locations in Miami, Florida. The agreement resolves the department’s investigation into whether Pizzerias violated the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) by discriminating against work-authorized immigrants when checking their work authorization documents.

The department’s investigation concluded that Pizzerias routinely requested that lawful permanent residents produce a specific document – a Permanent Resident Card – to prove their work authorization, while not requesting a specific document from U.S. citizens. Lawful permanent residents often have the same work authorization documents available to them as U.S. citizens, and may choose acceptable documents other than a Permanent Resident Card to prove they are authorized to work. The antidiscrimination provision of the INA prohibits employers from subjecting employees to unnecessary documentary demands based on citizenship or national origin.

Under the settlement, Pizzerias must pay a civil penalty of $140,000 to the United States, post notices informing workers about their rights under the INA’s antidiscrimination provision, train their human resources personnel, and be subject to departmental monitoring and reporting requirements.

“The Justice Department is committed to ensuring the rights of lawful U.S. workers to be free from discriminatory barriers based on their citizenship, immigration status, or national origin,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Tom Wheeler of the Civil Rights Division. “Pizzerias’ responsiveness throughout the course of the investigation assisted in a speedy resolution of this matter.”

The division’s Immigrant and Employee Rights Section (IER), formerly known as the Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices, is responsible for enforcing the anti-discrimination provision of the INA. The statute prohibits, among other things, citizenship, immigration status, and national origin discrimination in hiring, firing, or recruitment or referral for a fee; unfair documentary practices; retaliation and intimidation.

For more information about protections against employment discrimination under immigration laws, call IER’s worker hotline at 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired); call IER’s employer hotline at 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired); sign up for a free webinar; email IER@usdoj.gov; or visit IER’s English and Spanish websites.

Applicants or employees who believe they were subjected to different documentary requirements based on their citizenship, immigration status, or national origin; or discrimination based on their citizenship, immigration status, or national origin in hiring, firing, or recruitment or referral, should contact IER’s worker hotline for assistance.

SHAWN N. ANDERSON, Acting United States Attorney for the Districts of Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, announced that defendants GUAM CONSTRUCTION COMPANY (“GCC”) and its President BYONG HEE KANG (88 years of age) were convicted and sentenced for Conspiracy to Commit Visa Fraud. Also, CHOON HEE KANG (76 years of age), the sister of BYONG KANG and former Vice President of GCC was convicted and sentenced for Conspiracy to Commit Money Laundering.

On July 10, 2015, a Superseding Indictment was returned against GCC, BYONG HEE KANG, and CHOON HEE KANG. Charges included Conspiracy to Commit Visa Fraud by intentionally misrepresenting the occupations of H-2B workers in an effort to fraudulently obtain H-2B visas. After the workers arrived in Guam, BYONG HEE KANG caused GCC to employ them in skilled occupations not authorized on their H-2B visas. Additionally, CHOON HEE KANG and her co-defendants were charged with Conspiracy to Launder Money, which involved financial transactions with visa fraud proceeds exceeding $1,140,878.07. The United States also sought the forfeiture of money equal to the value of the proceeds of that offense.

On March 20, 2017, Chief Judge Francis Tydingco-Gatewood of the District of Guam sentenced the Defendants as follows:

GCC sentenced to:

• 5 years probation (during which it must submit to unannounced examination of its books and records by the probation officer or experts engaged by the court);
• $1,875,407.12 in criminal forfeiture, which represented visa fraud proceeds seized from the GCC corporate bank account.
• An additional $27,000 fine
• $400 assessment fee

Defendant BYONG HEE KANG was sentenced to:

• 3 years probation with 14 months of home detention;
• $10,000 fine
• $2,334 restitution to R.N.Q.
• $100 Special Assessment fee
• Forfeiture of all rights and interest in the visa fraud proceeds.

Defendant CHOON HEE KANG was sentenced to:

• Time served and 3 years of supervised release.
• As a condition of supervised release, report to DHS for removal or deportation proceedings
• $7,500 fine
• $100 Special Assessment fee
• Forfeiture of all rights and interest in the visa fraud proceeds. 

Shawn N. Anderson, Acting U.S. Attorney for the Districts of Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, stated, "Maintaining the integrity of the H-2B visa program is vital to our business community. The Department of Justice will continue to prosecute those who seek personal enrichment through dishonest business practices. The forfeiture of nearly $2 million in visa fraud proceeds is a significant step toward accountability for corporate wrongdoers such as GCC, its President BYONG KANG and former Vice President CHOON KANG.”

The investigation was a joint effort involving local and federal law enforcement, including the Department of Homeland Security - Homeland Security Investigations, the Internal Revenue Service - Criminal Investigations, the U.S. Department of Labor - Wage & Hour Division, the Guam Department of Labor, and Guam Customs & Quarantine Agency. This case was prosecuted by Stephen F. Leon Guerrero and Belinda Alcantara, Assistant United States Attorneys for the District of Guam.

Attorney General Sessions released the following statement on the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Declined Detainer Outcome Report:

“This important report demonstrates a clear and ongoing threat to public safety. It is not acceptable for jurisdictions to refuse to cooperate with federal law enforcement by releasing criminal aliens back into our communities when our law required them to be deported. The Department of Justice will use all lawful authority to ensure that criminals who are illegally in this country are detained and removed swiftly and to hold accountable jurisdictions that willfully violate federal law.”

PHILADELPHIA – Christina Svanda, 46 of Pottstown pleaded guilty to charges stemming from her schemes to defraud her employer. Svanda was employed as the financial manager for a family owned furniture business with store locations in Pottstown and Chester Springs, Pennsylvania. She pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud, one count of wire fraud, and one count of filing a false individual income tax return. United States District Court Judge Jan E. DuBois scheduled a sentence hearing for June 20, 2017. Svanda faces a maximum possible statutory sentence of 43 years in prison, a fine up to $750,000, a $300 special assessment, three years of supervised release, and full restitution of as much as $1,050,029.

In August 2009, Svanda began writing checks from the furniture business’ bank account at Downingtown National Bank to cover her personal credit card bills. Between August 2009 and May 2015, Svanda stole approximately $858,669 from the furniture business’s bank account to pay her personal credit card bills.

Svanda also defrauded the furniture business by wrongfully increasing her pay by a total of $191,359 between 2009 and 2015. The furniture company used a third-party payroll service. Svanda called in the payroll to the third-party service on a weekly basis. Each week, there were changes to payroll, including bonuses paid to sales staff who met sales goals, as well as additional pay earned by the warehouse staff when they worked on the sales floor. Svanda was not entitled to bonus pay or personal pay for warehouse staff. However, records from the payroll service show that Svanda wrongfully instructed the payroll service to increase her pay by a total of $191,359 between 2009 and 2015.

Finally, Svanda filed income tax returns that failed to report the $858,669 that she stole from the furniture company’s bank account to pay her own credit card bills. Thus, her personal federal income tax return for the year of 2013 failed to include $258,882 that she embezzled that year, resulting in tax due and owing of $81,497.

This case was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service. It is being prosecuted by Assistant United States Attorney Karen Grigsby.

WASHINGTON – Interpol Washington, the U.S. National Central Bureau (USNCB), recently reached a significant milestone in its 20-year partnership with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC). In February, the total number of reports made available to Interpol member countries through NCMEC’s CyberTipline and Interpol’s I-24/7 secure messaging system exceeded 5 million.

Pursuant to its nonprofit private mission to help reduce child sexual exploitation, NCMEC works with Interpol Washington to provide law enforcement officials urgent and timely leads and information to prevent child sexual exploitation and abuse. Historically, these leads were not actionable due to the unavailability of law enforcement contacts as well as a lack of an established mechanism for making the reports available to law enforcement in certain jurisdictions. Interpol’s I-24/7 secure messaging system is the tool that is being used to quickly and effectively make available the information and leads to investigative law enforcement entities around the world. Foreign Universal Resource Locators (URL) Internet leads received by Interpol Washington are provided to NCMEC. Images and other forms of media containing actual evidence are provided to U.S. law enforcement agencies for potential action.

The source of the shared information is NCMEC’s CyberTipline® reports. In May 2014, Interpol’s I-24/7 secure messaging system tool went live and the service became available to approximately 140 Interpol member countries after a 30-day pilot program was completed. The pilot program was designed to test how Interpol member countries assimilated data made available from NCMEC. By November 2015, 1 million CyberTipline reports had been made available to international law enforcement agencies, with 38 countries requesting additional follow-up information. Today, more than 5 million CyberTipline reports have been made available through Interpol’s I-24/7, a secure, encrypted messaging system accessible by only the country where the leads are sent. This project allows for electronic distribution, 24 hours, 7 days a week, 365 days a year without personnel resources.

“On behalf of Interpol Washington, I would like to thank NCMEC and its leadership for its ongoing and extraordinary efforts in partnering with the USNCB to reach this historic milestone toward the global sharing of information among law enforcement in the fight against child exploitation,” stated Wayne H. Salzgaber, Acting Director of the USNCB.

NCMEC created the CyberTipline to further NCMEC’s mission of helping to prevent and diminish the sexual exploitation of children in March 1998 using hardware, software, and programming assistance donated by Sun MicroSystems, The CyberTipline provides the public and electronic service providers (ESPs) with the ability to report online (and via toll-free telephone) suspected child sexual abuse images, instances of online enticement of children for sexual acts, extra-familial child sexual molestation, child sexual abuse, child sex tourism, child sex trafficking, unsolicited obscene materials sent to a child, misleading domain names, and misleading words or digital images on the Internet. NCMEC continuously reviews CyberTipline reports to ensure that reports of children who may be in imminent danger get first priority. After NCMEC’s review is completed, all information in a CyberTipline report is made available to law enforcement.

“Interpol Washington is a crucial ally in NCMEC’s efforts to reduce the dissemination of child sexual abuse images around the world and prevent future child victimization,” said John Shehan, vice president of the Exploited Children Division at the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. “We’re tremendously proud of our work with Interpol Washington and its commitment to help bring an end to child sexual exploitation worldwide.”

More than 18.4 million reports of suspected child sexual exploitation have been made to the CyberTipline between 1998 and March 11, 2017.

A component of the U.S. Department of Justice, Interpol Washington is co-managed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. As the designated representative to the International Criminal Police Organization (Interpol) on behalf of the Attorney General, Interpol Washington serves as the national point of contact for all Interpol matters, coordinating international investigative efforts among member countries and the more than 18,000 local, state, federal, and tribal law enforcement agencies in the United States.

On Wednesday, March 15, 2017, officials from the Government of Vietnam visited INTERPOL Washington—the U.S. National Central Bureau (USNCB)—to learn about the agency’s mission, role, and functions in the United States and internationally.  They also discussed police cooperation between the United States and Vietnam in efforts to combat transnational crime and enhance border security. The six-member group is in the United States participating in the Strategic Leadership Development for Senior Vietnamese Government Officials (S-LEAD) program. Established in 2016, the program is supported by the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam, the Vietnam Initiative at Indiana University, and the U.S. Department of State.

S-LEAD provides executive-level training to select senior officials slated for promotion to vice-ministerial positions in Vietnam.  Each year, two groups of Vietnamese officials spend two months in the United States participating in research and training.  The activities include taking graduate courses and conducting research at Indiana University, visiting and studying different U.S. federal and state government agencies, and participating in an executive leadership program at Harvard University.

In addition to listening to the INTERPOL Washington mission overview, the Vietnamese visitors toured the INTERPOL Operations and Command Center, which operates 24 hours per day, 7 days a week, 365 days per year.

A component of the U.S. Department of Justice, INTERPOL Washington is co-managed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. As the designated representative to the International Criminal Police Organization on behalf of the Attorney General, INTERPOL Washington serves as the national point of contact for all INTERPOL matters, coordinating international investigative efforts among member countries and the more than 18,000 federal, state, local, and tribal law enforcement agencies in the United States.

A Northern California real estate investor was sentenced yesterday for his role in a conspiracy to rig bids at public real estate foreclosure auctions in Northern California, the Department of Justice announced.

John Michael Galloway was charged on Dec. 3, 2014, in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury in the Northern District of California. He pleaded guilty to one count of bid rigging in Oakland, California, on Nov. 16, 2016.  Yesterday, Galloway was sentenced to serve 12 months of imprisonment and ordered to pay a $74,899 criminal fine and $265,050 in restitution.

Between June 2008 and January 2011, Galloway conspired with others not to bid against one another, instead designating a winning bidder to obtain selected properties at public real estate foreclosure auctions in Contra Costa County. The members of the conspiracy then held second, private auctions to award the properties to members of the conspiracy and determine payoffs for other conspirators who had agreed not to bid against each other at the public auctions. The private auctions often took place at or near the courthouse steps where the public auctions were held. The primary purpose of the conspiracies was to suppress and eliminate competition in order to obtain selected real estate offered at Contra Costa County public foreclosure auctions at noncompetitive prices. When real estate properties are sold at public auctions, the proceeds are used to pay off the mortgage and other debt attached to the property, with the remaining proceeds, if any, paid to the homeowner.

Yesterday's sentence is a result of the department’s ongoing investigation into bid rigging at public real estate foreclosure auctions in California’s San Francisco, San Mateo and Contra Costa counties. These investigations are being conducted by the Antitrust Division’s San Francisco Office and the FBI’s San Francisco Office

Anyone with information concerning bid rigging or fraud related to public real estate foreclosure auctions should contact the Antitrust Division’s San Francisco Office at 415-934-5300 or call the FBI tip line at 415-553-7400.

On March 14 – 16, 2017, officials from INTERPOL Washington – U.S National Central Bureau (USNCB) met with their counterparts in Indonesia to participate in a Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) Workshop to assist INTERPOL Jakarta and Immigration with improving their submissions of Stolen and Lost Travel Documents (SLTD) to the INTERPOL SLTD database and use of INTERPOL tools and services for enhanced border screening capabilities.

INTERPOL Washington’s Office of the Chief Information Officer has partnered with the U.S. Department of State on a Southeast Asia Capacity Building Initiative. Indonesia is one of four countries targeted by the United States to receive assistance in upgrading their access to INTERPOL information sharing resources. The other countries are Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines. Funding provided by the State Department enables INTERPOL Washington to collaborate with member countries lacking the infrastructure, resources and funding to regularly submit Stolen and Lost Travel Documents (SLTD) to the INTERPOL SLTD database, or to integrate INTERPOL’s tools and services for automated border screening and national network connectivity to INTERPOL’s I-24/7 network.

INTERPOL Washington is implementing a standardized methodology for integrating the full suite of INTERPOL tools and services into each country’s existing national architecture.  The integration will be done in three phases.  First, INTERPOL Washington will assess what adjustments and equipment are required to enhance the country’s information sharing capabilities.  Second, the initiative will enhance border or immigrations screening capabilities by integrating INTERPOL’s I-24/7 network allowing the country to seamlessly screen travelers against INTERPOL data during routine border or immigration encounters. Third, INTERPOL Washington will help the member country’s technical personnel to integrate I-24/7 services into their existing national immigration and border screening systems.

This initiative seeks to operationalize compliance with United Nations (UN) Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 2178 section 13 and 14. The resolution encourages member countries to “… prevent the movement of terrorists or terrorist groups by effective border controls …” and to improve international, regional, and sub-regional cooperation through increased sharing of information.

Technical consultation services and assessments are being provided to each country by the INTERPOL Washington Development and Operations Team in collaboration with the INTERPOL General Secretariat.   The consulting service is provided to the member country at no cost. The INTERPOL Washington Capacity Building initiative will expand the global use of the suite of INTERPOL tools and services for implementing effective border security safeguards and management techniques.

A component of the U.S. Department of Justice, INTERPOL Washington is co-managed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. As the designated representative to the International Criminal Police Organization on behalf of the Attorney General, INTERPOL Washington serves as the national point of contact for all INTERPOL matters, coordinating international investigative efforts among member countries and the more than 18,000 local, state, federal, and tribal law enforcement agencies in the United States.

The U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado has entered a permanent injunction against EonNutra LLC, two related companies, CDSM LLC and HABW LLC, and their owner, Michael Floren, to prevent the sale and distribution of adulterated and misbranded dietary supplements and unapproved and misbranded drugs, the Justice Department announced today.

The Department filed a complaint on March 10 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado, alleging that the defendants, who sell some 150 dietary supplement products, violated the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FDCA). Although labelled as dietary supplements, several of the defendants’ products were, according to the complaint, marketed as drugs, with claims that the products could help treat or prevent a host of serious conditions or diseases, including heart disease, diabetes, depression, hypertension, osteoporosis, and liver and kidney disorders. But, according to the complaint, the defendants offered these claims to the consuming public, notwithstanding the absence of FDA approval. Some of the specific products identified in the complaint as unapproved drugs were 4NOx2, HGH Night Time, rHGH Drops Black Label, Primal Rage Levo 5 GH Mass and Deer Antler Velvet Extract. Additionally, as the complaint alleges, the defendants sold these supplements without implementing the requisite procedures to validate the supplements’ composition.

“The Department of Justice will continue to work cooperatively with FDA so that consumers can be confident in the claims of sellers of drugs and dietary supplements,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Chad A. Readler of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “Manufacturers need to ensure the quality and identity of the ingredients that go into their products, so that such products are safe for consumers and the public can rely on the integrity of those products.”

The complaint alleged that the defendants marketed several of their products as drugs through a series of disease-related treatment claims even though these same products had not received FDA approvals. The complaint further alleges that, despite repeated warnings from FDA, the defendants continued to post statements on their websites claiming that their products cured, mitigated, treated, or prevented a number of serious diseases. According to the complaint, these claims were unsupported by any well-controlled clinical studies or other credible scientific substantiation. In addition, the complaint alleges that the defendants’ products did not contain adequate directions for such uses. The complaint continued that directions for use, including dosages, warnings, and side effects, must be premised on clinical data derived from scientifically controlled investigation, and since the defendants persisted in making disease-related treatment claims about their products in the absence of any well-controlled scientific test data, the products were misbranded.

In addition to claims related to sales of unapproved drugs, the complaint further alleges that the defendants’ products were adulterated dietary supplements because they were not manufactured in compliance with federal good manufacturing practice regulations. Under the FDCA, dietary supplement manufacturers are required to have systems in place to ensure that their products meet specifications for identity, purity, strength and composition. According to the complaint, a 2016 FDA inspection of the defendants’ manufacturing facility revealed, among other things, that the defendants failed to establish specifications for the identity, purity, strength, and composition of their finished products or the components in their products, or prepare and follow their manufacturing plans. The complaint also alleges that many of the labels on the defendants’ supplements were deficient, and caused the products to be misbranded under the FDCA. The complaint alleges, for example, that some of the defendants’ supplement labels did not list all of the products’ ingredients, indicate the correct serving size, or indicate the number of servings in a bottle.

The defendants agreed to settle the litigation and be bound by a consent decree of permanent injunction. The consent decree requires that if the defendants wish to resume manufacturing drugs or dietary supplements in the future, they must implement the remedial measures set forth in the consent decree, notify the FDA of the measures they have taken, and obtain written approval from the FDA that they appear to be in compliance with both the terms of the consent decree and the provisions of the FDCA.

“Lying to the public so you can make money is a bad idea,” said Acting U.S. Attorney for the District of Colorado Bob Troyer. “Doing it in a way that jeopardizes their health and safety is a REALLY bad idea. We have a long history in the West of not tolerating snake-oil salesmen.”

This matter was handled by Trial Attorney Christopher O’Connell of the Civil Division’s Consumer Protection Branch, with the assistance of Assistant U.S. Attorney Jacob Licht-Steenfat of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Colorado and Senior Counsel Michele Svonkin of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of General Counsel.

For more information about the Consumer Protection Branch and its enforcement efforts, visit its website at https://www.justice.gov/civil/consumer-protection-branch. For more information about the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Colorado, visit its website at https://www.justice.gov/usao-co.

Retired U.S. Navy Rear Admiral Bruce Loveless and eight other high-ranking Navy officers are charged in a federal indictment with accepting luxury travel, elaborate dinners and services of prostitutes from foreign defense contractor Leonard Francis, the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Glenn Defense Marine Asia (GDMA), in exchange for classified and internal U.S. Navy information.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Blanco of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, Acting U.S. Attorney Alana W. Robinson of the Southern District of California, Director Dermot F. O’Reilly of the Defense Criminal Investigative Service (DCIS) and Director Andrew L. Traver of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) made the announcement.

Including today’s defendants, a total of 25 named individuals have been charged in connection with the corruption and fraud investigation into GDMA, a defense-contracting firm based in Singapore. Of those charged, 20 are current or former U.S. Navy officials and five are GDMA executives. To date, 13 have pleaded guilty while several other cases are pending.

“The defendants in this indictment were entrusted with the honor and responsibility of administering the operations of the U.S. Navy’s Seventh Fleet, which is tasked with protecting our nation by guarding an area of responsibility that spanned from Russia to Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Blanco. “With this honor and awesome responsibility came a duty to make decisions based on the best interests of the Navy and the 40,000 Sailors and Marines under their care who put their lives at risk every day to keep us secure and free. Unfortunately, however, these defendants are alleged to have sold their honor and responsibility in exchange for personal enrichment.”

“This is a fleecing and betrayal of the United States Navy in epic proportions, and it was allegedly carried out by the Navy’s highest-ranking officers,” said Acting U.S. Attorney Robinson. “The alleged conduct amounts to a staggering degree of corruption by the most prominent leaders of the Seventh Fleet – the largest fleet in the U.S. Navy - actively worked together as a team to trade secrets for sex, serving the interests of a greedy foreign defense contractor, and not those of their own country.”

“The allegations contained in today’s indictment expose flagrant corruption among several senior officers previously assigned to the U.S. Navy’s Seventh Fleet. The charges and subsequent arrests are yet another unfortunate example of those who place their own greed above their responsibility to serve this nation with honor‎,” said Director O’Reilly. “This investigation should serve as a warning sign to those who attempt to compromise the integrity of the Department of Defense that DCIS and our law enforcement partners will continue to pursue these matters relentlessly.”

“Naval Criminal Investigative Service, in concert with our partner agencies, remains resolved to follow the evidence wherever it leads, and to help hold accountable those who make personal gain a higher priority than professional responsibility,” Director Traver. “It's unconscionable that some individuals choose to enrich themselves at the expense of military security.”

Nine defendants were arrested today on various charges including bribery, conspiracy to commit bribery, honest services fraud, obstruction of justice and making false statements to federal investigators when confronted about their actions. Four of the defendants are retired captains: (1) David Newland, 60, of San Antonio, Texas, (2) James Dolan, 58, of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, (3) David Lausman, 62, of The Villages, Florida, and (4) Donald Hornbeck, 56, a resident of the United Kingdom. The other defendants arrested today included: (5) Colonel Enrico Deguzman, 48, of Honolulu, Hawaii, (6) retired Chief Warrant Officer Robert Gorsuch, 48, of Virginia Beach, Virginia (7) retired Rear Admiral Bruce Lovelace, 48, of San Diego, California, (8) active duty Lieutenant Commander Stephen Shedd, 48, of Colorado Springs, Colorado and (9) active duty Commander Mario Herrera, 48, of Helotes, Texas.

The defendants were arrested early this morning in California, Texas, Pennsylvania, Florida, Colorado and Virginia. The United States will seek to move all of these cases to federal court in San Diego, California. Admiral Loveless was taken into custody at his home in Coronado and was expected to make his first appearance in federal court this afternoon.

According to the indictment, the Navy officers allegedly participated in a bribery scheme with Leonard Francis, in which the officers accepted travel and entertainment expenses, the services of prostitutes and lavish gifts in exchange for helping to steep lucrative contracts to Francis and GDMA and to sabotage competing defense contractors. The defendants allegedly violated many of their sworn official naval duties, including duties related to the handling of classified information and duties related to the identification and reporting of foreign intelligence threats. According to the indictment, the defendants allegedly worked in concert to recruit new members for the conspiracy, and to keep the conspiracy secret by using fake names and foreign email service providers. According to the indictment, the bribery scheme allegedly cost the Navy – and U.S. taxpayers – tens of millions of dollars.

In addition to the nine defendants charged today, the 11 Navy officials charged so far in the fraud and bribery investigation are: (1) Admiral Robert Gilbeau, (2) retired Captain Michael Brooks, (3) Commander Jose Luis Sanchez, (4) Captain Daniel Dusek, (5) former Department of Defense civilian employee Paul Simpkins, (6) Commander Michael Misiewicz, (7) Lieutenant Commander Gentry Debord, (8) Lieutenant Commander Todd Malaki, (9) Petty Officer First Class Daniel Layug, (10) Naval Criminal Investigative Service Supervisory Special Agent John Beliveau and (11) Commander Bobby Pitts.

Gilbeau, Brooks, Sanchez, Dusek, Simpkins, Misiewicz, Debord, Malaki, Layug and Beliveau have pleaded guilty. Gilbeau, Brooks, and Sanchez await sentencing. On March 25, 2016, Dusek was sentenced to 46 months in prison and ordered to pay a $70,000 fine and $30,000 in restitution to the Navy. On Dec. 2, 2016, Simpkins was sentenced to 72 months in prison. On April 29, 2016, Misiewicz was sentenced to 78 months in prison and ordered to pay a $100,000 fine and $95,000 in restitution to the Navy. On Jan. 12, 2017, Debord was sentenced to 30 months in prison and ordered to pay a $15,000 fine and $37,000 in restitution to the Navy. On Jan. 29, 2016, Malaki was sentenced to 40 months in prison and ordered to pay a $15,000 fine and $15,000 in restitution to the Navy. On Jan. 21, 2016, Layug was sentenced to 27 months in prison and a $15,000 fine. On Oct. 14, 2016, Beliveau was sentenced to 12 years in prison and ordered to pay $20 million in restitution to the Navy. Pitts was charged in May 2016 and his case is pending.

Additionally, to date, five GDMA executives have been charged: (1) Alex Wisidagama, (2) Francis, (3) Edmund Aruffo, (4) Neil Peterson and (5) Linda Raja. Three have pleaded guilty: Wisidagama, Francis and Aruffo. On March 18, 2016, Wisidagama was sentenced to 63 months in prison and ordered to pay $34.8 million in restitution to the Navy. Francis and Aruffo await sentencing. Peterson and Raja were extradited to the United States from Singapore in September 2016 and their cases remain pending.

The charges and allegations contained in an indictment are merely accusations. The defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

DCIS, NCIS and the Defense Contract Audit Agency are investigating the case. Assistant Chief Brian R. Young of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Mark W. Pletcher and Patrick Hovakimian of the Southern District of California are prosecuting the case.

Anyone with information relating to fraud or corruption should contact the NCIS anonymous tip line at www.ncis.navy.mil or the DOD Hotline at www.dodig.mil/hotline or call (800) 424-9098.

Today, the Office for Victims of Crime (OVC), part of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Justice Programs, announced an $8,466,970 Antiterrorism and Emergency Assistance Program (AEAP) grant to assist victims of the June 2016 mass shooting at Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida. OVC will award the grant tomorrow to the Florida Office of the Attorney General.

“This funding will provide important support to the victims, their loved ones and communities who were affected by last year’s devastating attack on Pulse nightclub,” said Attorney General Jeff Sessions. “We continue to mourn those who were taken from us that awful day, and we admire the resilience of the great city of Orlando. With this grant, we reaffirm the Justice Department’s commitment to the people of Orlando, the families of the victims and all who are helping those affected by this heinous crime.”

“OVC is committed to assisting the recovery, healing and justice for all victims of crime and this award will help to provide much needed support, emotionally and financially, as they continue to heal,” said Acting OVC Director Marilyn McCoy Roberts. “This award will reimburse victim services costs for operation of the Family Assistance Center in the immediate aftermath of the shooting, and ensure that victims, witnesses and first responders receive necessary services to help them adjust in the aftermath of violence, begin the healing process and cope with probable re-traumatization.”

On June 12, 2016, Omar Mateen, 29, entered Pulse nightclub with an assault rifle and handgun, opening fire on club patrons while holding them hostage. During the attack, Mateen killed 49 people and injured more than 50 others, making it the deadliest mass shooting in U. S. history. Mateen was eventually killed during a shootout with police.

Victim services funding is awarded to and distributed by the Florida Office of the Attorney General’s Department of Legal Affairs.

In 1995, following the Oklahoma City bombing, Congress authorized OVC to set aside and administer up to $50 million annually from the Crime Victims Fund for the Antiterrorism Emergency Reserve Fund to assist victims in extraordinary circumstances. Following an act of terrorism or mass violence, jurisdictions can apply for an AEAP grant award for crisis response, criminal justice support, crime victim compensation and training and technical assistance expenses. OVC also provided AEAP funds and assistance following the below mass violence incidents:

in, San Bernardino, California (2015); Roseburg, Oregon (2015); Charleston, South Carolina (2015); Marysville, Washington (2014); Boston, Massachusetts (2013); Newtown, Connecticut (2012); Oak Creek, Wisconsin (2012); Aurora, Colorado (2012); Tucson, Arizona (2011); Binghamton, New York (2009); at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (2007); and the Minnesota Department of Public Safety on behalf of the Red Lake Nation (2005).

          For more information on the AEAP, please visit http://ojp.gov/ovc/AEAP/index.html.

The Office of Justice Programs (OJP), headed by Acting Assistant Attorney General Alan R. Hanson, provides federal leadership in developing the nation’s capacity to prevent and control crime, administer justice and assist victims. OJP has six components: the Bureau of Justice Assistance; the Bureau of Justice Statistics; the National Institute of Justice; the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention; the Office for Victims of Crime and the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering and Tracking. More information about OJP can be found at www.ojp.gov.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions today issued the following statement regarding Sunday’s fatal shooting in New Mexico:

“We are all saddened to learn of the death on Sunday of Navajo Nation Officer Houston Largo, who was shot and killed while responding to a domestic violence call. This dedicated young officer chose a life of service to others, despite knowing that each time he put on his badge he might not come home safely. His death reminds us once again that our men and women in law enforcement willingly face danger each day to protect us all – and for this, they deserve our lasting gratitude, respect and support. Our U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Mexico and the FBI are working closely with state and tribal authorities to investigate this tragic incident and ensure that the killer of this brave officer faces justice.  My thoughts and prayers, and those of the entire Department of Justice, go out to the family, loved ones and colleagues of Officer Largo.”

The Justice Department reached an agreement today with Paragon Building Maintenance, Inc. (Paragon) and Pegasus Building Services Company, Inc. (Pegasus), related janitorial companies headquartered in Long Beach, California.  The settlement resolves the department’s investigation into whether the companies violated the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) by discriminating against work-authorized immigrants when checking their work authorization documents.

The department concluded, based on its investigation, that Paragon and Pegasus routinely requested that lawful permanent residents show their Permanent Resident Cards to prove their work authorization while not requesting specific documents from U.S. citizens.  Lawful permanents residents often have the same work authorization documents available to them as U.S. citizens, and may choose other acceptable documents besides the Permanent Resident Card to prove they are authorized to work.  The investigation further revealed that the companies required lawful permanent resident employees to re-establish their work authorization when their Permanent Resident Cards expired, even though federal rules prohibit this practice.  The antidiscrimination provision of the INA prohibits employers from subjecting employees to unnecessary documentary demands based on the employees’ citizenship or national origin. 

“Employers may not discriminate against employees when verifying that their employees are authorized to work in the United States,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Tom Wheeler of the Civil Rights Division. “We encourage employers everywhere to familiarize themselves with their legal obligations, as Paragon and Pegasus have committed to do by reaching this settlement.”

Under the settlement, Paragon and Pegasus will pay a civil penalty of $115,000 and pay up to $30,000 to compensate any eligible workers who lost pay due to these documentary practices.  The companies also have agreed to post notices informing workers about their rights under the INA’s antidiscrimination provision, train their human resources personnel, and be subject to departmental monitoring and reporting requirements.

The division’s Immigrant and Employee Rights Section (IER), formerly known as the Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices, is responsible for enforcing the antidiscrimination provision of the INA.  The statute prohibits, among other things, citizenship, immigration status, and national origin discrimination in hiring, firing, or recruitment or referral for a fee; unfair documentary practices; retaliation and intimidation.

For more information about protections against employment discrimination under immigration laws, call IER’s worker hotline at 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired); call IER’s employer hotline at 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired); sign up for a free webinar; email IER@usdoj.gov; or visit IER’s English and Spanish websites.

Applicants or employees who believe they were subjected to different documentary requirements based on their citizenship, immigration status, or national origin; or discrimination based on their citizenship, immigration status, or national origin in hiring, firing, or recruitment or referral, should contact IER’s worker hotline for assistance.

Charles River Laboratories International Inc. has agreed to pay the U.S. government $1.8 million to settle claims that it violated the False Claims Act by improperly charging for labor and other associated costs that were not actually provided on certain National Institutes of Health contracts, the Justice Department announced today. Charles River is a for-profit corporation headquartered in Wilmington, Massachusetts.

“Contractors are expected to deal fairly with federal agencies when receiving taxpayer funds,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Chad A. Readler of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “The Department of Justice will continue to ensure that contractors spend taxpayer dollars appropriately and that those who do not are held accountable.”

Charles River holds contracts with National Institutes of Health (NIH) for services relating to the development, maintenance, and distribution of colonies of animals as well as the provision of laboratory animals to the NIH. Charles River billed to NIH labor and associated costs of employees at its Raleigh, North Carolina and Kingston, New York facilities despite the fact these individuals did not render the services as Charles River had claimed. Charles River disclosed the improper billing to the Department of Justice and the Department of Health and Human Services.

“Companies that do business with the federal government must bill honestly,” said Special Agent in Charge Phillip M. Coyne of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General (HHS-OIG).

“We expect companies that contract with HHS to provide the services as claimed and paid for by the taxpayers,” said Chief Counsel to the Inspector General, HHS-OIG, Gregory E. Demske. “Charles River’s self-disclosure and resolution of this matter underscores the importance of contractors preventing, detecting, and remediating overcharges of labor costs to HHS. Under our contractor self-disclosure program, OIG is committed to working with HHS contractors that detect fraud issues to review, take any appropriate action, and resolve these matters fairly.”

The case was handled by the Civil Division’s Commercial Litigation Branch and the HHS-OIG. The claims settled by this agreement are allegations only, and there has been no determination of liability.

Senior leaders from INTERPOL Washington, the U.S. National Central Bureau (USNCB), participated in the annual International Criminal Police Organization (INTERPOL) Heads of National Central Bureaus (NCB) conference this week. The gathering brought together 270 police officials from 149 countries. INTERPOL Washington representatives were Acting Director Wayne Salzgaber, Chief of Staff Bernard Graham, and Deputy Chief of Staff Joseph Ferrigno. The conference, held March 7-9 at INTERPOL Headquarters in Lyon, France, highlighted the need for increased sharing of biometric data, such as fingerprints, DNA and facial recognition, and enhanced use of INTERPOL’s firearms tracing and ballistic data sharing capabilities, according to INTERPOL.

INTERPOL Washington serves as the designated U.S. representative to INTERPOL on behalf of the Attorney General. While it is a component of the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), INTERPOL Washington is co-managed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS).

U.S. membership in INTERPOL is authorized by U.S. law. As a condition of membership, the United States maintains a National Central Bureau (NCB) in Washington, D.C., which liaises with INTERPOL’s General Secretariat and the National Central Bureaus of INTERPOL’s 189 other member countries. The United States also details law enforcement officials to serve at INTERPOL Headquarters.

INTERPOL Washington coordinates U.S. law enforcement actions and responses, ensuring that they are consistent with U.S. interests and law, as well as INTERPOL policies, procedures, and regulations. As the official U.S. point of contact in INTERPOL's worldwide, police-to-police communications and criminal intelligence network, INTERPOL Washington operates 24/7/365. It supports more than 18,000 local, state, federal, and tribal law enforcement agencies in the United States as well as their foreign counterparts seeking assistance in transnational criminal investigations.

INTERPOL Washington criminal investigative data assists U.S. law enforcement officials in bringing many criminals to justice. To date in 2017, two major high profile cases benefited from INTERPOL Washington assistance. For example, INTERPOL Washington partnered with U.S. and international law enforcement agencies to bring down four multi-million dollar international fraud and money laundering schemes perpetrated by a transnational organized crime network. In another case, the subject of an INTERPOL Red Notice, wanted for a July 10, 2016, murder in the Dominican Republic, was arrested Thursday, February 23, by U.S. Marshals and Immigrations & Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents with the New York/ New Jersey Regional Fugitive Task Force. INTERPOL Washington also provided critical assistance during that investigation. These are only two examples of the contributions INTERPOL Washington makes to domestic and international law enforcement.

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A federal court in Spokane, Washington has found Dr. James Hood, a dentist, and his wife, Karen Hood, in contempt for violating the Court’s previous permanent injunction requiring them to timely file payroll tax returns and pay payroll taxes, announced Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. Hubbert of the Justice Department’s Tax Division. The Court ordered the Hoods to close their dental care businesses, cease operating as employers, and barred them from opening any new businesses where the Hoods would serve as employers.

On March 8, U.S. District Court Judge Rosanna Malouf Peterson for the Eastern District of Washington found James Hood and Karen Hood in contempt after they demonstrated a consistent pattern of disregarding their tax obligations by making incomplete employment tax payments, making dishonored payments, and missing deadlines. The Court had previously entered a permanent injunction requiring James and Karen Hood, and their entities, to comply with the federal employment tax laws.

According to the United States’ supplemental filing in the case, the Hoods had failed to show full compliance with the tax laws and the Court’s injunction by Jan. 31, as the Court had ordered. The court found that, the Hoods had failed to pay their taxes for the Fourth Quarter 2016 by the end of January 2017. The court also found that the Hoods had attempted to make payroll tax payments that were dishonored due to insufficient funds in their accounts.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Hubbert thanked the revenue officer of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Field Collection for investigating the taxpayer’s tax compliance.

In the past decade, the Tax Division has obtained injunctions against hundreds of employers that fail to meet their employment tax obligations. Information about these cases is available on the Justice Department’s website.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions today directed federal prosecutors nationwide to engage in a focused effort to investigate, prosecute and deter the most violent offenders. 

This builds on the announcement last week of the creation of the U.S. Department of Justice Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety, which is central to the Attorney General’s commitment to combatting illegal immigration and violent crime, such as drug trafficking, gang violence and gun crimes, and to restoring public safety to all of the nation’s communities.

“Turning back our nation’s recent rise in violent crime is a top priority for the Department of Justice, and it requires decisive action from our federal prosecutors,” said Attorney General Sessions.  “I’m urging each of them to continue working closely with their counterparts at all levels, and to use every tool we have to put violent offenders behind bars and keep our citizens safe.”

In a memo to federal prosecutors in the department’s 94 United States Attorney’s Offices, the Attorney General made clear that prosecuting violent criminals is a high priority and prosecutors should work closely with their federal, state, local and tribal law enforcement partners to target the most violent offenders in each district.  Working together, law enforcement at every level should determine which venue – federal or state – would best get those identified immediately off our streets and punished appropriately for their crimes. 

The memo states when federal prosecution is determined appropriate, federal prosecutors should ensure the individuals driving violent crime in their district are prosecuted using the tools at their disposal, which may include firearms offenses, including possession and straw purchasing offenses; possession of a firearm during and in relation to a violent crime or drug trafficking offense; Hobbs Act robbery; carjacking; violent crime in aid of racketeering; Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act; and drug offenses under the Controlled Substances Act, among others. 

The Attorney General recognized that many offices are already employing these strategies and asked that those offices ensure their efforts are achieving the desired results.

Additional guidance and support in executing this priority will be forthcoming.

Kiekert AG, an automotive parts manufacturer based in Heiligenhaus, Germany, has agreed to plead guilty and to pay a $6.1 million criminal fine for its role in a conspiracy to rig bids of side-door latches and latch minimodules installed in cars sold in the United States and elsewhere, the Department of Justice announced today.  

According to a one-count felony charge filed today in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan, Kiekert participated in a conspiracy to eliminate competition by agreeing to allocate sales, rig bids and fix prices for side-door latches and latch minimodules sold to Ford Motor Company and its subsidiaries in the United States and elsewhere between September 2008 and May 2013.  In addition to Kiekert’s agreement to pay a $6.1 million criminal fine, the manufacturer has agreed to cooperate with the department’s ongoing investigation.  The plea agreement is subject to court approval.

“The Antitrust Division has uncovered conspiracies involving more than 50 automotive parts,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Brent Snyder of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.  “Automobile manufacturers, and the American consumers who buy their cars, are entitled to prices set by competition, not secret cartels.”

“Americans expect corporations in the United States and overseas to conduct their business honestly.  To do anything less, compromises consumer trust,” said Special Agent in Charge David P. Gelios of FBI’s Detroit Division.  “Today’s plea agreement of Kiekert AG, demonstrates the resolve of the FBI and the Department of Justice to protect American consumers from price fixing and bid rigging schemes that ultimately harm the U.S. economy.”

Side-door latches secure car doors to the body.  Latch minimodules include the side-door latch and all related mechanical operating components, including the electronic lock function.  

According to the charges, Kiekert officials participated in meetings and communications with representatives of another major side-door latch producer, during which they agreed to allocate sales, rig bids and fix prices submitted to Ford.  To effectuate those agreements, the conspirators exchanged information on bids and price quotations for submission to Ford. 

Today’s charge is the result of an ongoing federal antitrust investigation into price fixing, bid rigging and other anticompetitive conduct in the automotive parts industry, which is being conducted by the Antitrust Division’s criminal enforcement sections and the FBI.  Including Kiekert, 48 companies and 65 executives have been charged in the division’s ongoing investigation and have agreed to pay a total of more than $2.9 billion in criminal fines. 
                         
These charges were brought by the Antitrust Division’s Chicago Office and the FBI’s Detroit Field Office with the assistance of the FBI headquarters’ International Corruption Unit.  Anyone with information on price fixing, bid rigging and other anticompetitive conduct related to other products in the automotive parts industry should contact the Antitrust Division’s Citizen Complaint Center at (888) 647-3258, visit www.justice.gov/atr/contact/new case.html or call the FBI’s Detroit Field Office at (313) 965-2323.

A federal court in Orlando, Florida, has permanently barred Jason Stinson, of Longwood, Florida, from preparing federal tax returns for others and from owning or operating a tax return preparation business, following a six-day bench trial held in 2016, the Justice Department announced today. The civil order, signed by Judge Anne C. Conway of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, also requires Stinson to disgorge to the United States $949,952.47 of funds he received from “improper and fraudulent tax return preparation.”

The court determined that Stinson owns a company called “Nation Tax Services” and had stores in four states: Birmingham and Fairfield, Alabama; St. Petersburg and Tampa, Florida; Albany and Augusta, Georgia; and Greenville and Raleigh, North Carolina. Stinson’s stores, the court found, targeted “underprivileged, undereducated poor people and earned income credit claims.”

The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is a refundable tax credit for working people with low to moderate income. Eligibility depends on factors such as the amount of income, filing status, and the amount of dependents. To illustrate, the court noted that customers with earned income between $13,050 and $17,100 in tax year 2012 could receive the maximum EITC. The court found that Stinson falsified information on his customers’ returns to claim the maximum EITC amount by: “claiming bogus dependents, fabricating unreimbursed employee expenses and charitable contributions, and fabricating business income and expenses.” The court found that in many instances Stinson and his preparers fraudulently lowered a customer’s taxable income by claiming false unreimbursed business expenses in large amounts, at times more than half of what the customer earned in a given year. According to the court’s decision, “it is illogical for an individual making $35,000 a year to spend as much as half of their yearly income, around $16,000, on unreimbursed business expenses.”

Stinson’s stores charged customers in excess of $600 to prepare a single tax return, even as much as $999, sometimes without telling the customer, the court determined. Moreover, the court found that Stinson’s practice was to take his fees out of his customer’s refund, rather than charge fees upfront, meaning that “a larger refund was better for the client and better for Stinson.” Based upon the pattern of abusive claims made by Stinson and his preparers, the court ordered Stinson to pay the United States nearly $950,000 in fees he received.

“The Tax Division works with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to protect taxpayers from unscrupulous return preparers,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. Hubbert of the Justice Department’s Tax Division. “Court decisions like this show that those who prepare false tax returns will be stopped and will not profit from their fraudulent conduct.”

Acting Assistant Attorney General Hubbert thanks the Tax Division attorneys assigned to the case, Daniel Applegate, Sean Green, Alison Yewdell, Steven Woodliff, Jared Wiesner, and Joshua Levine, and the revenue agents of the IRS—Small Business/Self-Employed Division, who conducted the investigation.

Return preparer fraud is one of the IRS’s Dirty Dozen Tax Scams for 2017 and taxpayers seeking a return preparer should remain vigilant. The IRS has some tips on their website for choosing a return preparer and has launched a free directory of federal tax preparers.

In the past decade, the Tax Division has obtained injunctions against hundreds of unscrupulous tax preparers. Information about these cases is available on the Justice Department’s website. An alphabetical listing of persons enjoined from preparing returns and promoting tax schemes can be found on this page. If you believe that one of the enjoined persons or businesses may be violating an injunction, please contact the Tax Division with details.

A senior paramilitary leader and one of Colombia’s most notorious drug traffickers was sentenced on Friday to serve 198 months in prison for his role leading an international drug trafficking conspiracy responsible for the importation of ton-quantities of cocaine into the United States.   Acting Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Blanco of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and Chief of Operations Anthony Williams of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) made the announcement. 

Hernan Giraldo Serna, a Colombian national, pleaded guilty in 2009 to one count of conspiracy to distribute cocaine knowing and intending that it would be imported into the United States.  U.S. District Judge Reggie B. Walton imposed the sentence.

According to admissions in the plea agreement, Serna ascended to a leadership position in 1996 within the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia (United Self Defense Forces of Colombia or AUC), a terrorist and paramilitary organization in Colombia.  In September 2001, the AUC was designated a Foreign Terrorist Organization by the U.S. Department of State.  In May 2003, the AUC was placed on the Significant Foreign Narcotics Traffickers list by order of the President, pursuant to the Foreign Narcotics Kingpin Designation Act.  In February 2004, Giraldo Serna individually was designated as a Tier II Kingpin by the Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, subjecting him to severe economic sanctions under the Kingpin Act. 

The statement of facts also established that Giraldo Serna became a senior commander in the AUC by 1996, and his armed force controlled a significant part of northern Colombia.  In connection with his guilty plea, Giraldo Serna admitted that, from the early 1990s through the early 2000s, soldiers operating under his direction controlled large areas in northern Colombia where cocaine was cultivated, produced and distributed. Giraldo Serna also admitted to providing security for drug traffickers in the region under his control, including those individuals responsible for coca cultivation and distribution.  Giraldo Serna also admitted to knowing that multi-ton quantities of cocaine were manufactured and transiting the region under his control and that significant quantities of that cocaine was transported to the United States.  He further admitted his responsibility for the illegal importation of thousands of kilograms of cocaine into the United States. 

“The sentence demonstrates the successful and vigorous partnership we have with our law enforcement colleagues in Colombia.  We have been able to disrupt the flow of drugs coming from the north coast of Colombia, and punish the narco-traffickers responsible,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Blanco.  “This defendant, operating with the resources of an illegal para-military group that controlled drug trafficking in a large portion of northern Colombia, distributed large quantities of cocaine into international commerce, much of which was imported into the United States.  International drug traffickers who believe they can operate with impunity learn the hard way that they cannot, and we will continue to work with our international partners to bring to justice those who knowingly transport cocaine to the United States.”

“DEA agents work every day to attack global criminal networks that use drug trafficking as a means to finance their terrorist activities and we are pleased that this AUC leader will finally face American justice,” said DEA Chief of Operations Williams.  “We will continue to work with our international partners as DEA targets the transnational criminal groups destroying the lives of many people around the world.”    

Today’s sentence does not account for violations of Colombian human rights-related laws allegedly committed by Giraldo Serna, which are being addressed in Colombia through the Justice and Peace process – a legal framework enacted in 2005 to facilitate the demobilization of its paramilitary organizations – and Colombian criminal justice system.     

The case was investigated by DEA’s Bogota and Cartagena, Colombia Country Offices, and the DEA Special Operations Division.  The government of Colombia provided invaluable assistance through the investigation, prosecution, and sentencing of this case, with specific assistance provided by the Judicial Police of the Prosecutor General’s Office in Colombia and the Colombian National Police.  

This case was prosecuted by Trial Attorney Paul Laymon of the Criminal Division’s Narcotic and Dangerous Drug Section (NDDS), with significant assistance provided by the NDDS Judicial Attachés in Bogotá, Colombia; the Criminal Division’s Office of International Affairs; and the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Republic of Colombia (Fiscalía), including the Fiscalía’s Transnational Justice program.

Hackensack, NJ - The subject of an INTERPOL Red Notice, wanted for a July 10, 2016, murder in the Dominican Republic, was arrested Thursday, February 23, by U.S. Marshals and Immigrations & Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents with the New York/ New Jersey Regional Fugitive Task Force. INTERPOL Washington—the U.S. National Central Bureau (USNCB)--provided critical assistance during the investigation.

Kelbin Perez De Los Santos was being sought on an international arrest warrant for fatally shooting a man with a shotgun in a restaurant after a verbal altercation. The incident occurred in Los Girasoles near the capital city of Santo Domingo. Perez De Los Santos is thought to have fled the Dominican Republic shortly after the incident. The INTERPOL National Central Bureau in Santo Domingo issued a Red Notice in August 2016 requesting Perez De Los Santos’ arrest.

After receiving information from INTERPOL that Perez De Los Santos could be in the United States, the U.S. Marshals International Investigations Branch determined that the fugitive was likely residing in the Hackensack area, and on Thursday, members of the U.S. Marshals New York/New Jersey Regional Fugitive Task Force, along with ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations agents, tracked Perez De Los Santos to an apartment where he was arrested on immigration violations.

De Los Santos is currently being held in the custody of ICE and is facing deportation back to the Dominican Republic.

The U.S. Marshals Service is the primary agency within the federal government responsible for locating and apprehending fugitives who are wanted by foreign countries and who have been identified and located in the United States. Cases are referred to the U.S. Marshals Service through INTERPOL Washington (USNCB), the Department of Justice-Office of International Affairs (DOJ-OIA), and through foreign embassies in the United States.

A component of the U.S. Department of Justice, INTERPOL Washington is co-managed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. As the designated representative to the International Criminal Police Organization on behalf of the Attorney General, INTERPOL Washington serves as the national point of contact for all INTERPOL matters, coordinating international investigative efforts among member countries and the more than 18,000 local, state, federal, and tribal law enforcement agencies in the United States.

Additional information about the U.S. Marshals Service can be found at http://www.usmarshals.gov.

A federal indictment was unsealed today in San Antonio, Texas, charging four individuals for their roles in a cocaine distribution conspiracy, announced the Department of Justice.

Jesus Armando Chavez, 40, and Michelle Chavez, 35, both of Del Rio, Texas; Jose Luis Balderas, 29, of Eagle Pass, Texas; and Javier Hernandez, 31, of San Antonio, are charged in a 14-count indictment unsealed today in the Western District of Texas with conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute cocaine and possession with intent to distribute cocaine.  On March 2, the defendants were arrested and appeared for their initial appearances before U.S. Magistrate Judge John W. Primomo in San Antonio.

According to the indictment, between August 2014 and May 2016, the defendants allegedly knowingly and intentionally conspired with each other to possess and distribute narcotics, including cocaine, in the Western District of Texas. 

The defendants face a statutory maximum sentence of 20 years in prison, if convicted on the charges. 

An indictment is merely an allegation and a defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.

The FBI, the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Immigration And Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations, and the Texas Department of Public Safety investigated the case.  Assistant U.S. Attorney Charlie Strauss for the United States is prosecuting the case. 

A federal grand jury in the Eastern District of New York returned indictments separately charging three Queens, New York residents with identity theft-related crimes, announced Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department’s Tax Division.

According to the indictments, which were unsealed today, Sharon Coffee-Dean, a former Social Security Administration (SSA) employee, Kishore Jattan and Michael Bratton were each indicted for aggravated identity theft, misusing stolen social security numbers and fraudulent activity in connection with identification documents. Coffee-Dean was also indicted for conspiring to defraud the SSA and Bratton was also indicted for conspiring to defraud the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

The indictment against Coffee-Dean alleges that from approximately December 2011 through January 2012, she stole the IDs of 41 people from SSA records, which she then sold to other individuals who used them to file fraudulent tax returns with the IRS. If convicted, Coffee-Dean faces a statutory maximum sentence of five years in prison for conspiracy, five years for fraud and related activity in connection with means of identification, 10 years for the misuse of a social security number as an SSA employee and a mandatory minimum of two years in prison for aggravated identity theft. She also faces a term of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.

The indictment against Jattan alleges that while working as a messenger, from April through June 2012, he stole student IDs from packages he delivered for a University located in New York and sold the stolen IDs to other individuals who used the IDs to file fraudulent tax returns with the IRS. If convicted, Jattan faces a statutory maximum sentence of five years for fraud and related activity in connection with means of identification, five years for misuse of a social security number and a mandatory minimum sentence of two years in prison for aggravated identity theft. He also faces a term of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.

The indictment against Bratton alleges that from January 2011 through June 2012, he purchased stolen IDs, which he provided to a co-conspirator for the purpose of filing fraudulent tax returns with the IRS. If convicted, Bratton faces a maximum of five years for misuse of a social security number and a mandatory minimum of two years in prison for aggravated identity theft. He also faces a term of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties. An indictment is not a finding of guilt. Individuals charged in indictments are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Goldberg thanked special agents of IRS–Criminal Investigation, U.S. Postal Inspection Service, and the SSA Office of the Inspector General, New York Field Division, who conducted the investigations, and Trial Attorneys Mark Kotila and Ann M. Cherry of the Tax Division, who are prosecuting these cases.

Additional information about the Tax Division and its enforcement efforts may be found on the division’s website.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions today issued the following statement:

“During the course of the confirmation proceedings on my nomination to be Attorney General, I advised the Senate Judiciary Committee that ‘[i]f a specific matter arose where I believed my impartiality might reasonably be questioned, I would consult with Department ethics officials regarding the most appropriate way to proceed.’ 

“During the course of the last several weeks, I have met with the relevant senior career Department officials to discuss whether I should recuse myself from any matters arising from the campaigns for President of the United States. 

“Having concluded those meetings today, I have decided to recuse myself from any existing or future investigations of any matters related in any way to the campaigns for President of the United States. 

“I have taken no actions regarding any such matters, to the extent they exist. 

“This announcement should not be interpreted as confirmation of the existence of any investigation or suggestive of the scope of any such investigation. 

“Consistent with the succession order for the Department of Justice, Acting Deputy Attorney General and U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia Dana Boente shall act as and perform the functions of the Attorney General with respect to any matters from which I have recused myself to the extent they exist.” 

A former U.S. Air Force service member pleaded guilty today in connection with a scheme to defraud the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), announced Acting Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Blanco of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division.

Jacqueline Crawford, 33, of Gulfport, Mississippi, pleaded guilty today before U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta of the District of Columbia to one count of conversion of government funds.  As part of her plea agreement, Crawford has agreed to forfeit $45,917.  

According to her plea agreement, in October 2014, Crawford spoke with a friend and former U.S. Air Force service member, who worked at the VA in Washington, D.C., and described her financial difficulties.  In response, her friend suggested that he could send her VA hardship money available to veterans and that all he needed was her bank account information.  Crawford agreed to this arrangement despite knowing that her friend was not obtaining the hardship money through proper channels.  He later asked Crawford to kick back a portion of the money she received to him, which she agreed to do despite knowing that it was wrong.  Between October 2014 and February 2015, Crawford received a total of seven unlawful special payments from the VA totaling $45,917.  Crawford admitted she kicked back $13,100 of the funds she received from her friend via 16 wire transfers, usually through Walmart2Walmart money grams.  

The VA Office of Inspector General Criminal Investigations Division investigated the case.  Trial Attorney Richard B. Evans of the Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section is prosecuting the case. 

Attorney General Jeff Sessions today announced the formation of the U.S. Department of Justice Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety.  

The Task Force was formed pursuant to the President’s Executive Order on a Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety and will be chaired by the Deputy Attorney General.  Task Force members will be drawn from relevant Department components, and will include the Director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), the Administrator of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), the Director of the FBI and the Director of the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS). 

“The President issued an executive order, and I feel strongly about it,” said Attorney General Sessions.  “On my first day in office, I called in the heads of the four major law enforcement agencies to discuss this plan.  Violent crime is on the rise, and we must always remember that crimes are committed against real people.  The creation of this task force is a critical step toward confronting this crisis vigorously, effectively and immediately.”

The task force is central to the Attorney General’s commitment to combatting illegal immigration and violent crime, such as drug trafficking, gang violence and gun crimes, and to restoring public safety to all of the nation’s communities.

The task force is charged with developing strategies to reduce crime; identifying deficiencies in existing laws and policies that have made them less effective in reducing crime and proposing new legislation and policies to improve public safety and reduce crime; evaluating the availability and adequacy of crime-related data and identifying measures to improve it; and conducting any other relevant studies.  In conducting its work, the task force will consult with federal, state, tribal and local law enforcement, law enforcement organizations and victims’ and community advocacy organizations, among others, to learn about successful local efforts and how they can best be supported at the federal level. 

“For more than a hundred years the women and men of the FBI have worked to address threats to the American people,” said Director James Comey of the FBI.  “I look forward to continuing and building upon the great partnerships with our federal, state, local, and tribal counterparts on this initiative to combat violent crimes, gang activities and drug trafficking – all of which exact a high toll on our country.”

“The safety and well-being of our communities and our citizens is a vital part of our mission,” said Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg of the DEA.  “I look forward to our continued close work on the task force with our law enforcement partners on these crucial issues.”

“The men and women of the United States Marshals Service stand ready to work with our federal, state, local and tribal law enforcement partners to remove the underlying criminal element from our communities,” said Acting Director David L. Harlow of USMS. “In 2016, working with our task force partners, the USMS arrested over 106,000 violent fugitives. We look forward to finding innovative methods to further reduce violent crime across our nation.”

“ATF’s top priority is reducing violent crime,” said Acting Director Thomas Brandon of the ATF.  “Across the nation, ATF focuses its resources on arresting and prosecuting violent criminals who use firearms to terrorize communities.  ATF’s Crime Gun Intelligence Centers provide timely, actionable leads to our agents and our partner agencies so they can identify, investigate and apprehend trigger-pullers and those who illegally supply them with firearms.   ATF looks forward to working with Attorney General Sessions and our federal, state, tribal and local law enforcement counterparts to further enhance our violent crime reduction strategies through the Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety.”

The owner and CEO of a Greenbelt, Maryland building contracting company was sentenced to 68 months in prison for stealing more than $1.7 million from Local 657 of the Laborers Union of North America (LIUNA) and other related offenses.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Blanco of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; Assistant Director in Charge Andrew W. Vale of the FBI’s Washington Field Office; Special Agent in Charge Robin Blake of the Department of Labor Office of Inspector General Washington, D.C., Regional Office; and District Director Mark Wheeler of the Department of Labor’s Office of Labor-Management Standards Washington, D.C., District Office made the announcement.  

Gary Amoes Cooper, 57, of Kettering, Maryland, the owner and CEO of STS General Contracting, was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta of the District of Columbia, who also ordered Cooper to pay $1.632 million in restitution to Local 657 and to forfeit $1.734 million of criminally-derived proceeds.

Evidence presented at trial demonstrated that Cooper and his co-defendant, Christopher Andrew Kwegan, conspired with Anthony Wendel Frederick Sr., the former business manager of Local 657 of LIUNA, to convert for personal use $1.7 million in funds stolen from Local 657.   LIUNA’s Local 657, now merged into LIUNA Local 11, represents construction laborers in Washington, D.C., and five adjacent counties.  

According to the evidence at trial, from May 2013 to June 2014, Frederick directed more than $1.7 million in Local 657 funds to STS General Contracting for an unauthorized construction project and other work which STS General Contracting did not intend to perform.  Cooper and Kwegan then made a number of financial payments to Frederick with the funds stolen from Local 657, including a down payment of $225,000 on a home Frederick purchased and directed more than $600,000 to a corporation owned in part by Frederick’s wife. 

Frederick, 51, of Upper Marlboro, Maryland, previously pleaded guilty to the same offenses and was sentenced to 48 months in prison and ordered to pay $1.632 million in restitution to Local 657 and to forfeit $1.734 million on Feb. 7.  Kwegan, 58, of Randallstown, Maryland, also previously pleaded guilty to the same offenses and was sentenced on Feb. 8.  Both Frederick and Kwegan were sentenced by Judge Mehta.

The FBI and Department of Labor investigated the case.  Trial Attorneys Vincent J. Falvo and David Karpel of the Criminal Division’s Organized Crime and Gang Section prosecuted the case.

A federal jury in Charleston, South Carolina, late yesterday convicted two chief engineers of the vessel, T/V Green Sky, of falsifying documents in order to conceal illegal discharges of oily bilge waste and obstruction charges, announced Acting Assistant Attorney General Jeff Wood of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division and U.S. Attorney Beth Drake of the District of South Carolina. Herbert Julian, who served as chief engineer of the vessel from Aug. 3 to Sept. 4, 2015, was convicted of two felony counts under the Act to Prevent Pollution from Ships (APPS) and for obstruction of justice. Panagiotis Koutoukakis, chief engineer from Feb. 1 to Aug. 3, 2015, was convicted of two felony counts, one for APPS and another for falsifying records.

In addition, it was revealed in court documents, which were unsealed after the verdicts were rendered, that Aegean Shipping Management, S.A., a foreign company with operations in Greece that acted as the Green Sky’s operator, previously pleaded guilty to a violation of the APPS and obstruction of justice.

“This case involved egregious violations of U.S. and international laws that are key to protecting the oceans from pollution, and deliberate efforts to mislead Coast Guard officials about these criminal acts,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Wood. “Now these defendants have been held accountable under the law by a jury of their peers. The Department of Justice will continue to aggressively prosecute criminal acts that pollute the oceans.”

“With Charleston serving as one of the largest ports on the Eastern seaboard, working vessel pollution cases with the Environmental Crimes Section is an important focus for our office,” said U.S. Attorney Beth Drake, District of South Carolina. “Through criminal charges, we can deter those who would dump oily wastes into the world’s oceans and use false documents to cover it up.”

“The Green Sky case stresses the vital importance of USCG environmental protection missions with regard to pollution from ships,” said Captain Gary L. Tomasulo, Commander, U.S. Coast Guard Sector Charleston. “We are extremely proud of our team of marine safety professionals and the Coast Guard Investigative Service which were an integral part of investigating these occurrences and referring them for enforcement action.”

The Green Sky is a large, oceangoing chemical tanker flagged in Liberia. The vessel first set sail in July 2014. The operation of marine vessels, like the T/V Green Sky, generates large quantities of oil-contaminated waste water. This particular vessel had unusual internal leaks that produced greater quantities of oily waste than a normal ship of its age and construction. Oily bilge waste must be removed from the vessel lest it fill up the bottom of the Engine Room and cause damage to equipment and jeopardize the safe handling of the ship. However, the law does not permit an oceangoing vessel to discharge these oily wastes directly into the sea.

The evidence presented to the jury showed that the Green Sky was regularly pumping contaminated and oily water directly overboard. None of these discharges were disclosed as required. The oil record book of the Green Sky was falsified to cover-up illegal overboard discharges of oily wastes from February to August 2015. Methods of falsification included omitting illegal bypass operations, claiming that the oil water separator was used when it had not been, and a series of false entries regarding the levels of the bilge holding tank, which were designed to further the cover-up. While most of these discharges occurred in international waters, evidence at trial revealed that at least two of these discharges were within the Exclusive Economic Zone of the United States during the ship’s voyage from Pascagoula, Mississippi, to Houston, Texas in May 2015.

The evidence presented during the fifteen-day trial demonstrated that the chief engineers covered up illegal overboard discharges that took place through two systems of “magic” hoses and a separate “magic” valve system designed to bypass the ship’s oil water separator. Koutoukakis and Julian falsified the oil record book to hide their illegal discharges. The vessel arrived in Charleston, South Carolina on August 26, 2015, when the false record was presented to the U.S. Coast Guard during an inspection of the vessel. The U.S. Coast Guard was tipped off by three whistleblowers who came forward to report the crimes and ask for protection from U.S. authorities.

By January 2016, it was determined that the former chief engineer Koutoukakis likely had information regarding the ongoing investigation into the Green Sky. Koutoukakis was later apprehended in Savannah, Georgia on a material witness warrant. Koutoukakis was subsequently indicted after further investigation revealed his substantial involvement in illegal discharges and records falsification. In addition, Julian was convicted of obstruction related to false statements that he made regarding the ship’s sounding log, which is a document that can be used to check the veracity of the oil record book. Testimony at trial revealed that Julian hid the log prior to the Green Sky’s arrival in Charleston and then lied to the Coast Guard about the vessel having a sounding log.

Prior to the initiation of the trial, on November 22, 2016, the Green Sky’s operator, Aegean Shipping Management, S.A. pleaded guilty to one APPS count for the illegal discharges and one obstruction count based on misrepresentations made by the vessel’s captain to the U.S. Coast Guard during the August 2015 boarding. The corporate vessel operator had been indicted along with the individuals on July 15, 2016. The plea materials were previously sealed to protect the integrity of the jury and the witnesses in the trial against the individual defendants. The unsealed documents revealed that the operating company agreed to pay a financial penalty of $2 million, which includes a criminal fine and a smaller community service component directed toward the Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary. The company will also be sentenced to probation and an environmental compliance plan. Sentencing of the company and defendants Julian and Koutoukakis will take place at a date that will be set by the court. At trial, the second engineer Nikolaos Bounovas was acquitted of all charges against him. The previously convicted Captain, Genaro Anciano, testified at the trial. His sentencing has yet to be scheduled.

This case was investigated by the U.S. Coast Guard Sector Charleston and the Coast Guard Investigative Service. The USCG Marine Safety Lab was critical to the analysis of oil samples taken from the vessel. With the support of Coast Guard Legal District Seven, the case was prosecuted by Christopher L. Hale and Kenneth Nelson of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Environmental Crimes Section and AUSA Matt Austin from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of South Carolina. Richard Udell, also of the Environmental Crimes Section, provided substantial assistance with regard to the corporate plea deal.

Background on MARPOL

A multi-national treaty, the MARPOL Protocol, and implementing U.S. law required the Green Sky to first process the oily bilge waste through a filtration machine, known as an oil-water separator. Before the bilge waste can go overboard, the law requires that any remaining petroleum should be reduced to a concentration of 15 parts per million (ppm) or less. Bilge waste that contains 15ppm or less of petroleum does not produce a sheen and looks like clear water when held up to the light. One of the principal ways that the MARPOL Protocol ensures that international vessels comply with the oil water separator requirement is through the mandate to accurately maintain the vessel’s oil record book. The oil record book is an official ship’s log that records various types of internal transfers and discharges of fuel, oil residue, and oily bilge wastes. Under MARPOL, when a ship comes to a U.S. port, its oil record book is subject to inspection. When the oil record book is falsified, it makes it extremely difficult for port control officials (in the United States, the U.S. Coast Guard) to adequately assess treaty compliance and the safe and environmentally sound operation of the vessel.

A 49-year-old Florida man was arrested in Miramar, Florida, following the return of a 12-count indictment against him by a grand jury in the Southern District of Florida, the Department of Justice announced today.

Claude Shaw aka Mac and Claude Mac, a U.S. citizen residing in Florida, was charged with two counts of mail fraud and 10-counts of wire fraud in connection with a fraudulent lottery scheme tied to Jamaica.

As alleged in the indictment, victims throughout the United States would receive telephone calls in which they were informed that they had won over a million dollars in a lottery and needed to pay fees in advance to claim their winnings. According to the indictment, the victims were instructed on how, and to whom, to send their money. The indictment alleges that the victims were instructed to send their money through wire transfers and the U.S. Postal Service to Shaw and others.

“These charges demonstrate our commitment to combating international lottery fraud, especially efforts to target potentially vulnerable individuals,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Chad A. Readler of the Justice Department’s Civil Division. “Financial schemes like these interfere with Americans’ financial security and will not be tolerated.”

The indictment alleges that Shaw discussed plans to receive victims’ money via text messages, and after receiving money from victims, Shaw would send a portion of the victims’ money to accomplices in Jamaica. As alleged in the indictment, the victims never received any lottery winnings. Five of the 10 wire fraud counts are based on money Shaw is alleged to have wired from the United States to an individual in Jamaica. If convicted of mail fraud or wire fraud, Shaw faces a statutory maximum term of 20 years in prison on each count.

“Predators tied to Jamaican lottery fraud often seek to exploit vulnerable individuals in our society,” said Inspector in Charge Antonio Gomez of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service’s Miami, Florida Division. “The U.S. Postal Inspection Service appreciates the continued partnership with the Department of Justice’s Consumer Protection Branch, bringing to justice those fraudsters who exploit their victims, including elderly individuals, using the U.S. mail.”

This indictment is part of the Department of Justice’s effort working with federal and other law enforcement to combat fraudulent lottery schemes in Jamaica preying on American citizens.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Readler commended the investigative efforts of the Postal Inspection Service. The case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorney Arturo DeCastro of the Civil Division’s Consumer Protection Branch.

An indictment merely alleges that crimes have been committed. All defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

For more information about the Consumer Protection Branch, visit its website at http://www.justice.gov/civil/consumer-protection-branch. For more information about the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, visit its website at https://www.justice.gov/usao-sdfl.

A North Carolina businessman was sentenced today to 15 months in prison for failing to pay over employment taxes, announced Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department’s Tax Division and Acting U.S. Attorney Sandra Hairston for the Middle District of North Carolina.  

According to court documents, Paul Harvey Boone, 54, of Hillsborough, North Carolina, owned and operated Boone Audio Inc. in Burlington, North Carolina.  For most of 2008 through 2011, Boone used company funds for personal expenses while failing to pay over the employment taxes withheld from his employees’ wages.  Boone also failed to file his individual income tax returns and pay personal income taxes for tax years 2008 through 2011.

“Paul Boone’s prison sentence serves as a reminder to employers that willfully failing to comply with employment tax obligations is a crime,” said Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Goldberg.  “We are committed to investigating, prosecuting and seeking incarceration of employers who use their employees’ funds to line their own pockets.”

“IRS – Criminal Investigation (CI) realizes the damaging consequences caused by Boone’s failure to pay over employment taxes,” said Acting Special Agent in Charge Michael C. Daniels of IRS-CI.  “It results in the loss of tax revenue to the U.S. government and in the loss of future social security or Medicare benefits for the employees.  Those who fail to do so will not be tolerated and will be prosecuted.”  

In addition to the term of prison imposed, Boone was ordered to serve three years of supervised release and to pay restitution to the IRS in the amount of $385,610. 

Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Goldberg and Acting U.S. Attorney Hairston commended special agents of IRS-CI, who conducted the investigation, and Trial Attorneys Lauren Castaldi and Nathan Brooks of the Tax Division and Assistant U.S. Attorney Anand Ramaswamy of the Middle District of North Carolina, who prosecuted the case.  

Additional information about the Tax Division and its enforcement efforts may be found on the division’s website.  

The Department of Justice and the Department of Education today withdrew guidance for educational institutions, issued in 2015 and 2016, that took the position that the prohibitions in Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972 and implementing regulations against discrimination on the basis of sex require access to sex-segregated facilities on the basis of gender identity rather than biological sex.  Attorney General Jeff Sessions issued the following statement:

“The Department of Justice has a duty to enforce the law. The prior guidance documents did not contain sufficient legal analysis or explain how the interpretation was consistent with the language of Title IX.  The Department of Education and the Department of Justice therefore have withdrawn the guidance.  Congress, state legislatures, and local governments are in a position to adopt appropriate policies or laws addressing this issue.  The Department of Justice remains committed to the proper interpretation and enforcement of Title IX and to its protections for all students, including LGBTQ students, from discrimination, bullying, and harassment.”

A Gulfport, Mississippi businessman was sentenced to 12 months in prison today for failing to file a 2009 individual income tax return, announced Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department’s Tax Division.

According to information provided to the court, Samuel Frazier, owned two companies in the Gulfport area: Frazier Fire Systems LLC and EZ Haul Demolition and Construction LLC. In 2011, Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) special agents contacted Frazier, because he had not filed a tax return since 1997. Frazier failed to file a 2009 individual income tax return despite earning gross income of $618,253.53, an amount well above the threshold triggering the requirement to file. For tax years 2007 through 2010, Frazier caused a tax loss of $210,589.

In addition to the term of prison imposed, Frazier was ordered to serve one year of supervised release and to pay restitution in the amount of $210,589 to the IRS.

Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Goldberg commended special agents of IRS-CI, who conducted the investigation, and Trial Attorney Nathan Brooks of the Tax Division, who prosecuted this case. Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Goldberg also thanked the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Mississippi for their assistance.

Additional information about the Tax Division and its enforcement efforts may be found on the division’s website.

Preparer Allegedly Claimed False Earned Income Tax and Education Credits for His Customers

A federal court in Fort Lauderdale, Florida has permanently barred Billy Philippe from preparing federal tax returns for others, the Justice Department announced today.  In its complaint, the government alleged that Billy Philippe of Broward County, Florida prepared fraudulent tax returns for his customers. The court found that, for purposes of entering an injunction only, Philippe engaged in tax return preparer conduct subject to penalty under the tax laws. Philippe agreed to the civil injunction order entered against him, which requires him to turn over to the United States a list of all persons for whom he prepared federal tax returns since 2012.  The court also authorized the United States to monitor Philippe’s compliance with the terms of the injunction.

The government’s complaint against Philippe, the majority owner of Advantage Tax Center Plus Inc., alleged that he prepared income tax returns for customers that fraudulently overstated the amount of the refunds due by falsely claiming refundable credits, including the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and credits for education expenses.  The complaint further alleged that Philippe frequently claimed fraudulently inflated wages or self-employment income in order to maximize the amount of EITC, a customer claimed.

According to the complaint, Philippe prepared at least 899 returns from 2011 and 2015.  The complaint alleged that audits of 44 returns prepared in 2014 and 2015 revealed that Philippe claimed credits his customers were not entitled to take and/or understated their correct tax liability by more than $300,000 in the aggregate.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is reminding taxpayers that the 2017 individual income tax return filing season began on Jan. 23, and there is information available on the IRS’s website. Return preparer fraud is one of the IRS’s Dirty Dozen Tax Scams for 2017 and taxpayers seeking a return preparer should remain vigilant.  The IRS has some tips on their website for choosing a tax preparer and has launched a free directory of federal tax preparers.  

In the past decade, the Tax Division has obtained injunctions against hundreds of unscrupulous tax preparers.  Information about these cases is available on the Justice Department’s website.  An alphabetical listing of persons enjoined from preparing returns and promoting tax schemes can be found on this page.  If you believe that one of the enjoined persons or businesses may be violating an injunction, please contact the Tax Division with details.

A Washington, D.C. return preparer pleaded guilty to preparing fraudulent tax returns, announced Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Stuart M. Goldberg of the Justice Department’s Tax Division.

According to documents filed with the court, Joann Little, 60, of Suitland, Maryland, worked as a return preparer in Washington D.C., at a tax preparation business formerly known as Instant Tax Service and more recently named Speedy Tax Service. Little prepared federal income tax returns for tax years 2009 through 2014 that sought refunds to which her clients were not entitled by including inflated charitable deductions, fictitious unreimbursed employee expenses and false businesses. Little caused a tax loss of at least $262,714.

The court did not set a sentencing date. Little faces a statutory maximum sentence of three years in prison for each count, a period of supervised release, restitution and monetary penalties.

Acting Deputy Assistant Attorney General Goldberg commended special agents of the Internal Revenue Service–Criminal Investigation who conducted the investigation, and Trial Attorneys Jason Scheff and Karen Kelly of the Tax Division, who are prosecuting the case.

Additional information about the Tax Division and its enforcement efforts may be found on the division’s website.

A Georgia man pleaded guilty today to operating an odometer fraud scheme involving over 100 vehicles, the Department of Justice announced today.  

Paul Robinson, 37, of Lawrenceville, Georgia, pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court in Norfolk, Virginia, to one count of conspiracy to commit securities fraud and odometer tampering.  

“We buy vehicles to help assist us in many aspects of our lives,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Chad Readler of the Justice Department’s Civil Division.  “No consumer makes such a significant purchase lightly and we have to be able to trust that a dealer is not selling one car and actually supplying a vastly inferior automobile paired with falsified title documents.  We are committed to prosecuting individuals who break that trust by rolling back odometers and passing off phony title.”

Robinson owned and operated Affordable Auto Body Repair, a repair shop and licensed salvage vehicle dealer located in Chesapeake, Virginia.  Robinson purchased older vehicles, many of which had been involved in accidents, from an automobile auction specializing in vehicles from insurance companies.  On over 100 of these vehicles, Robinson altered or replaced the odometer to reflect a false, lower mileage.  He then obtained fraudulent Virginia motor vehicle titles with mileage readings matching the false, lower mileage on the new odometer, and passed these falsified title documents on to the auto purchasers.  

Robinson obtained many of these fraudulent titles from a former DMV Select clerk named Steven Bazemore.  In many instances, Robinson asked Bazemore to return the documents used to procure the fraudulent titles rather than retaining the documents in the DMV file system.  This made it more difficult for the DMV to detect the fraud.  Bazemore previously pleaded guilty relating to his role in the conspiracy.  On Sept. 22, 2016, Bazemore was sentenced to one year of home confinement and ordered to pay restitution to the ultimate purchasers of the vehicles.  Robinson’s sentencing is scheduled for June 8.
    
This case was investigated by National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Office of Odometer Fraud Investigation (NHTSA) and the Virginia DMV.  NHTSA estimates that odometer fraud in the United States results in consumer losses of more than $1 billion annually and has established a special hotline to handle odometer fraud complaints.  Individuals having information relating to odometer tampering should call (800) 424-9393 or (202) 366-4761.

This case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorneys John W. Burke and Jacqueline Blaesi-Freed of the Civil Division’s Consumer Protection Branch with assistance from Assistant U.S. Attorney Alan Salsbury of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of Virginia. 

More information on odometer fraud is available at: http://www.nhtsa.gov/Odometer-Fraud.  Tips on detecting and avoiding odometer fraud are available at: www.nhtsa.gov/staticfiles/nvs/pdf/811284.pdf.

For more information about the Consumer Protection Branch and its enforcement efforts, visit its website at http://www.justice.gov/civil/consumer-protection-branch.  

The Department of Justice and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today announced that Pharmacia LLC (formerly known as Monsanto), Solutia Inc., ExxonMobil Oil Corp. and Cerro Flow Products have agreed, as responsible parties, to clean up six former waste disposal sites that comprise the Sauget Area 1 Superfund Site in Sauget, St. Clair County, Illinois. 

The settlement requires the companies to spend an estimated $14.8 million to conduct removal of areas of groundwater contamination source material at four former disposal areas, cap sites to prevent further movement of contaminants, continued operation and maintenance of a containment cell created to hold hazardous wastes, and installation of a monitoring well network.  EPA will oversee the work to be conducted by these four responsible parties, which will implement the cleanup remedy required by the agency’s 2013 Record of Decision for Sauget Area 1.  In addition, the companies will reimburse EPA $475,000 incurred in its past cleanup actions at the site.  The companies will also reimburse EPA for costs incurred in overseeing the work required by the settlement, except for the first $2 million.

Situated in the American Bottoms region across the Mississippi River from St. Louis, Missouri, Sauget Area 1 has been heavily industrialized since the early 1900s.  Sauget Area 1 consists of three closed landfills, two former surface impoundments, two borrow pits filled with debris, and Dead Creek, all of which received industrial wastes from as early as 1931 and until 1988.  EPA and Illinois have been investigating the Sauget Area 1 Sites since the early-1980s.  In the fall of 1995, EPA completed a CERCLA Removal Action at Site G.  On January 21, 1999, EPA issued an Administrative Order on Consent to Solutia and Pharmacia requiring them to conduct an Engineering Evaluation and Cost Analysis for the Sauget Area 1 contaminated source areas and Dead Creek, and to conduct a Remedial Investigation and Feasibility Study for Sauget Area 1 groundwater.  Also in 1999, EPA issued a Unilateral Administrative Order (UAO) requiring Monsanto Company and Solutia Inc., to replace culverts on Dead Creek to eliminate potential risks associated with flooding and associated adverse ecological impacts.  In 2001, EPA modified the UAO to address contamination in Dead Creek, including requirements for sediment removal above risk levels, disposal of the dredged sediments in an adjacent dedicated RCRA Subtitle C-compliant containment cell, and measures to protect Dead Creek from recontamination from adjacent landfills.  In all, pursuant to the UAO the responsible parties dredged and disposed of in the cell approximately 64,000 cubic yards of sediments.

Pursuant to these earlier orders and agreements, responsible parties have completed or paid for removal actions within Sauget Area 1, conducted investigations of remaining contamination and reimbursed nearly all of the United States’ past costs related thereto.  Taking into account the settlement being lodged today and the work previously performed at the site, over $50 million is being devoted to cleaning up the contamination at this site.

The settlement was lodged with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois and is subject to a 30-day public comment period and final court approval. It can be viewed at www.justice.gov/enrd/Consent_Decrees.html.

For more information on the site, please visit:  https://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/cursites/csitinfo.cfm?id=0500753

Raymond A. Barnes, 46, and Christopher A. Brown, 35, the former jail superintendent and assistant jail superintendent, respectively, of the Muskogee County Jail (MCJ), were resentenced in federal court today on multiple counts of civil rights offenses related to allegations of excessive force on inmates at MCJ on or between August 2009 and May 2011.  Brown was also convicted of making material false statements to the FBI.  Barnes was sentenced to two years in prison followed by three years of supervised release, and Brown was sentenced to 12 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release.

On Feb. 25, 2014, a federal jury convicted both Barnes and Brown of conspiring to violate the rights of inmates housed at MCJ by assaulting inmates themselves or by directing other jailers employed by MCJ to do so.  Specifically, the defendants did or caused the following to be done: unjustifiably strike, assault, harm and physically punish inmates at MCJ who were restrained, compliant and not posing a physical threat; organize “meet and greets,” whereby jailers would scare, punish and harm incoming inmates from neighboring counties by throwing and slamming the handcuffed inmates to the ground upon their arrival at MCJ; threaten to fire MCJ employees if they reported abusive behavior directly to the sheriff or to outside law enforcement authorities; require and encourage MCJ jailers to write incident reports that falsely justified uses of force and contained misleading or inaccurate accounts of what had occurred when force was used; and perpetuate an environment within MCJ that allowed unlawful beatings and assaults against inmates to continue indefinitely and without consequence.

Both defendants were also found guilty of violating the rights of an inmate identified as J.R. when both defendants slammed and threw J.R. head-first to the ground while he was handcuffed.  Barnes was additionally convicted of violating the rights of a second inmate, G.T., for similar conduct.  Brown was acquitted of violating the rights of G.T.

In addition, Brown was convicted of one count of making material false statements to the FBI.  Brown falsely claimed that, during meet and greets, the incoming inmate was ordered out of the transport vehicle and then “gently placed” on the ground.  But in fact, Brown knew at the time of his statement to the FBI that during these meet and greets the MCJ jailers routinely threw and slammed inmates to the ground even though the inmates were restrained and posed no physical threat.

“Corrections officers who use excessive force against inmates in their custody are violating the Constitution and their sworn oaths to uphold it,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Tom Wheeler of the Civil Rights Division.  “This department will vigorously enforce the civil rights laws of our nation.”

In 2015, Defendants Barnes and Brown were sentenced to twelve months and six months in prison, respectively. The Defendants appealed their convictions. The United States appealed the sentences as both procedurally and substantively unreasonable. In June 2016, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the convictions but overturned the sentences on the grounds of procedural unreasonableness. The court held that the trial judge had not adequately explained why the sentences were so much less severe than the sentences of 70 to 87 months called for under the Sentencing Guidelines.

This case was investigated by the Muskogee Resident Agency of the Oklahoma City Division of the FBI and prosecuted by Special Litigation Counsel Fara Gold and Trial Attorney Dana Mulhauser of the Civil Rights Division.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions sat down with Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel this afternoon in the Attorney General’s conference room to discuss what might be done to combat the shootings and murders in that city and bring back proactive community policing. 

The Attorney General also had a detailed and productive conversation with Secretary of Homeland Security John F. Kelly about steps the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security will take to secure our borders to end the flood of illegal immigration, drugs and human trafficking pouring into our country and undermining our national security.

In addition, the Attorney General also enjoyed meeting with Judge Neil Gorsuch and congratulated him on his nomination.
 

Attorney General Jeff Sessions today met with department heads and their staff in the Civil Rights and Civil Divisions, discussing ongoing cases and how each division can strengthen relationships with the department's law enforcement and regulatory partners and steps the department can take to combat the rise in violent crime. 

As part of his meeting with the Civil Division, he received a briefing on the status of litigation surrounding president’s executive order protecting our nation from foreign terrorists entering the United States.

Hot Springs, Arkansas - Kenneth Elser, United States Attorney for the Western District of Arkansas, announced that Alicia Bucy, age 60, of Hot Springs and Peaches Marie Herrick, age 40, of Kaufman, Texas, were sentenced today on one count each of Conspiracy to Distribute Methamphetamine. Bucy was sentenced to 87 months in federal prison followed by 3 years of supervised release and Herrick was sentenced to 97 months in federal prison followed by 3 years of supervised release. The Honorable Susan O. Hickey presided over the sentencing hearings in the United States District Court in Hot Springs.

According to court records, on October 20, 2015, members of the 18th Judicial East Drug Task Force executed a search warrant at the residence of Alicia Bucy where two prior controlled purchases of methamphetamine had been made. That residence is located in Royal, Arkansas, which is in the Western District of Arkansas. During the search, officers located a U.S. Postal Express parcel in the washing machine in the laundry room containing 170 grams of a substance which field tested positive for methamphetamine. The package label revealed that it was sent from Nacogdoches, Texas on October 15, 2015 and that it had arrived at Bucy’s residence on October 19, 2015. Through further investigation, it was learned that Peaches Herrick, who lived in Nacogdoches, had sent the parcel containing the drugs. Bucy waived her Miranda rights and gave a verbal statement to investigators stating that she had been distributing meth in the Hot Springs area for several years. She stated that she knew meth was in the mail parcel and that she had hid it in the washing machine. An examination of one of her cell phones revealed a text message which had been sent to co-conspirator, Peaches Herrick, discussing the shipment of the methamphetamine.

Bucy and Herrick were both named in a federal indictment in December, 2015. Bucy pleaded guilty in March, 2016 and Herrick pleaded guilty in February, 2016.

“We will continue to work together with our law enforcement partners to keep drugs out of our communities,” said Special Agent in Charge of HSI New Orleans Raymond R. Parmer, Jr. “Disrupting the flow of illegal drugs coming into our country continues to be one of our top priorities.”

Parmer is the special agent in charge of the New Orleans field office of HSI with responsibility for Arkansas, Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi and Tennessee.

This case was investigated by Homeland Security Investigations, the Hot Springs Police Department, and the 18th Judicial Drug Task Force. Assistant United States Attorney David Harris prosecuted the case for the United States.

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Related court documents may be found on the Public Access to Electronic Records website @ www.pacer.gov

On his first official day serving as the 84th Attorney General of the United States, Jeff Sessions arrived at the Justice Department and met with top department leadership right after greeting department employees in person and through a video message.

Following a visit on Capitol Hill with Luther Strange, who was appointed by Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley to fill Attorney General Sessions’ vacancy in the Senate, Attorney General Sessions received his first Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act briefing from national security staff. 

The Attorney General later met with the senior officials from the Justice Department’s law enforcement components, including FBI Director James Comey, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Acting Director Thomas Brandon, U.S. Marshals Service Acting Director David Harlow and Drug Enforcement Administration Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg.  They had a vigorous discussion about how to combat the rise in violent crime and prevent drug-related deaths.  They expressed their shared commitment to strengthen law enforcement and save lives. 

Attorney General Sessions also called top leadership of the National Urban League and National Association for the Advancement of Colored People to build positive relationships and outline his priorities for the Department of Justice, including his commitment to maintain sound policies for civil rights and voting rights.

In addition, Attorney General had important calls with leadership of the Fraternal Order of Police and the National Sheriffs and Major City Sheriffs to reaffirm his commitment to strengthening relationships with law enforcement communities.

Tonight, the Attorney General will give brief remarks at a closed press High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area awards banquet in Washington, D.C.

Judge Amy Berman Jackson for the District of Columbia ruled in favor of the Justice Department in its civil antitrust lawsuit to block health insurer Anthem, Inc.’s acquisition of Cigna Corp., the Justice Department announced. 

“Today’s decision is a victory for American consumers,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Brent Snyder of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.  “This merger would have stifled competition, harming consumers by increasing health insurance prices and slowing innovation aimed at lowering the costs of healthcare.  In concluding that Anthem’s acquisition of Cigna would violate federal antitrust laws, the court has protected consumers and the competition on which they rely.  I thank the hardworking staff of the Antitrust Division and our state partners, who conducted a thorough investigation and offered a clear and compelling presentation across a two-phase trial and never wavered in their commitment to protect competition in these markets.”

Today’s decision follows a trial that ran from Nov. 21, 2016, to Jan. 3, 2017.  In July 2016, the Justice Department along with 11 states and the District of Columbia sued to stop the merger. The complaint alleged that a combined Anthem and Cigna would substantially lessen competition in the health insurance industry in dozens of markets across the country. 

The district court’s opinion is temporarily under seal to allow the parties to review for confidentiality.

The United States was joined in the lawsuit by the District of Columbia and the States of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, New Hampshire, New York, Tennessee and Virginia.

A New Orleans-area woman prepares fraudulent tax returns for her customers, and the government seeks a court order barring her from preparing tax returns for others, according to a new civil suit filed by the United States, the Justice Department announced.

According to the government’s civil complaint, filed in federal court in New Orleans, Louisiana, Tiga Bryant fraudulently reduced her customers’ tax liabilities by improperly claiming bogus deductions and false fuel tax credits. In particular, the complaint alleges that Bryant, who does business as “Denson’s Fast Tax Services,” claims false employee business expense deductions that improperly reduce her customers’ taxable income. In one example, the complaint alleges that Bryant falsely claimed that one of her customers incurred employee business expenses totaling more than the wages this customer earned.

In addition to claiming fraudulent deductions for her customers, Bryant also claims bogus fuel tax credits, according to the complaint. Fraud involving the fuel tax credit was one of the IRS’s Dirty Dozen Tax Scams for 2016. The fuel tax credit is generally limited to off-highway business use, and consequently, not available to most taxpayers. The complaint alleges several examples in which Bryant improperly claimed a fuel tax credit for her customers who, the United States alleges, were clearly not entitled to the fuel tax credit because they did not purchase fuel for off-highway business use. In one example, Bryant reported that a customer used 2,500 gallons of fuel for off-highway business use and yet the customer did not even own a vehicle, according to the complaint.

The complaint alleges that the IRS audited 197 returns prepared by Bryant and determined that Bryant claimed credits and/or deductions her customers were not entitled to take on 96 percent (189) of these returns and understated their tax liabilities by more than $800,000.

The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is reminding taxpayers that the 2017 individual income tax return filing season began on Jan. 23, and there is information available on the IRS’s website. Return preparer fraud is one of the IRS’s Dirty Dozen Tax Scams for 2017 and taxpayers seeking a return preparer should remain vigilant. The IRS has some tips on their website for choosing a tax preparer and has launched a free directory of federal tax preparers.

In the past decade, the Tax Division has obtained injunctions against hundreds of unscrupulous tax preparers. Information about these cases is available on the Justice Department’s website. An alphabetical listing of persons enjoined from preparing returns and promoting tax schemes can be found on this page. If you believe that one of the enjoined persons or businesses may be violating an injunction, please contact the Tax Division with details.

First Individual to Plead Guilty in Ongoing Investigation

Matsuo Electric Co. Limited and one of its executives, Satoshi Okubo, have agreed to plead guilty for their roles in a conspiracy to fix prices and rig bids for electrolytic capacitors sold to customers in the United States and elsewhere, the Department of Justice announced today.

In charges filed today in the U.S. District Court of the Northern District of California, Matsuo and Okubo were charged in a conspiracy to suppress and eliminate competition of electrolytic capacitors by fixing prices and rigging bids.  The charges allege that Matsuo participated in the conspiracy from at least as early as November 2001 until about January 2014 and that Okubo participated in the conspiracy from at least as early as August 2002 until about January 2014.   

In addition to pleading guilty, Matsuo has agreed to pay a criminal fine and Okubo has agreed to serve a prison term of one year and a day.  Both have agreed to cooperate with the Antitrust Division’s ongoing investigation.  The plea agreements are subject to court approval.

“The simultaneous acceptance of responsibility by a company and the executive who supervised its involvement in the cartel demonstrates in a concrete way their future commitment to lawful conduct and an improved business culture,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Brent Snyder of the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.  “The division continues to investigate this industry and will take the steps necessary to ensure that the executives involved in the conspiracy are held accountable, and that the companies that participated undertake changes to instill a culture of compliance and remediation.”

Electrolytic capacitors store and regulate electrical current in a variety of electronic products, including computers, televisions, car engine and airbag systems, home appliances and office equipment.

Today’s charges result from an ongoing federal antitrust investigation into price fixing, bid rigging and other anticompetitive conduct in the electrolytic capacitors industry.  The investigation is being conducted by the Antitrust Division’s San Francisco Office and the FBI’s San Francisco Field Office.  With today’s charges, six companies and 10 individuals have now been charged in the division’s ongoing investigation.

Anyone with information on price fixing, bid rigging, or other anticompetitive conduct related to the capacitors industry should contact the Antitrust Division’s Citizen Complaint Center at 1-888-647-3258, visit www.justice.gov/atr/contact/newcase.html, or call the FBI tip line at 415-553-7400.

Matsuo Information

Okubo Information

A former business manager of the Local 657 of the Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA) was sentenced today to 48 months in prison for stealing more than $1.7 million from Local 657.

Acting Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Blanco of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, Assistant Director in Charge Andrew W. Vale of the FBI’s Washington Field Office, Special Agent in Charge Robin Blake of the Department of Labor Office of Inspector General Washington, D.C., Regional Office and District Director Mark Wheeler of the Department of Labor’s Office of Labor-Management Standards Washington, D.C., District Office made the announcement.  

Anthony Wendel Frederick Sr., 50, of Upper Marlboro, Maryland, was sentenced today by U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta of the District of Columbia, who also ordered Frederick to pay $1,632,000 in restitution to Local 657 and to forfeit $1,734,000 of criminally-derived proceeds.

LIUNA’s Local 657, now merged into LIUNA Local 11, is a labor organization that represents construction laborers in Washington, D.C., and five adjacent counties.  Frederick served as the business manager for Local 657 for approximately 10 years until June 2014.

According to Frederick’s plea and co-conspirator’s trial evidence, from approximately May 2013 through June 2014, Frederick directed more than $1.7 million in Local 657 funds to STS General Contracting of Greenbelt, Maryland, without the knowledge or authorization of the Local 657 Executive Board or LIUNA International officials.  Frederick also admitted that principals of STS General Contracting made a number of financial payments to Frederick with the funds stolen from Local 657, including a down payment of $225,000 on a home Frederick purchased and directed more than $600,000 to a corporation owned in part by Frederick’s wife. 

The FBI and the Department of Labor investigated the case.  Trial Attorneys Vincent J. Falvo and David Karpel of the Criminal Division’s Organized Crime and Gang Section prosecuted the case.

A federal jury convicted Thomas Joyce for his role in a conspiracy to rig bids at public real estate foreclosure auctions held in Contra Costa County, California, the Department of Justice announced today. 

After a week-long trial before honorable Chief Judge Phyllis J. Hamilton in Oakland, California, the jury convicted Joyce of one count of conspiring to rig bids at foreclosure auctions between about June 2008 and January 2011.  Joyce was charged in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury in the Northern District of California on Dec. 3, 2014.  

The evidence at trial showed that Joyce conspired with others to rig bids to obtain properties sold at foreclosure auctions in Contra Costa County.  The conspirators negotiated payoffs for agreeing not to compete and then held second, private auctions known as “rounds” to determine the amounts of the payoffs for the individuals who had participated in the bid suppression.

Including Joyce’s conviction, 64 individuals have either pleaded guilty or been convicted after trial of criminal charges as a result of the department’s ongoing antitrust investigations into bid rigging at public foreclosure auctions in Northern California.  Indictments are pending against several other real estate investors who participated in the conspiracy.

This conviction is the latest development in the division’s ongoing investigation into bid rigging at public real estate foreclosure auctions in California’s San Francisco, San Mateo, Contra Costa and Alameda counties.  The investigation is being conducted by the Antitrust Division’s San Francisco Office and the FBI’s San Francisco Office.

For more information about the task force, please visit www.StopFraud.gov.  Anyone with information concerning bid rigging or fraud related to public real estate foreclosure auctions should contact the Antitrust Division’s San Francisco Office at 415-934-5300 or call the FBI tip line at 415-553-7400.

The Justice Department filed a proposed consent decree today to resolve a complaint that the city of Philadelphia discriminated against an employee with a disability when it terminated the employee rather than reassign him to a vacant position for which he was qualified, in violation of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

According to the department’s complaint, the employee, who worked for the city as a sanitation worker, was terminated from his position after he had a heart attack and his doctor placed him under a 20-pound lifting restriction, which prevented him from continuing as a sanitation worker.  Although the employee made several requests for reassignment and the city had numerous vacant positions, the city failed to consider the employee for reassignment to a different position for which he was qualified.  Instead, the city terminated the employee because of his disability.    

The proposed consent decree, which is subject to approval by the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, requires the city’s streets department to revise its policies to ensure that reassignment is considered as a reasonable accommodation for employees with disabilities, train relevant employees on the ADA and report to the Justice Department on implementation of the decree.  The city will also offer to reinstate and reassign the employee to an open position for which he is qualified and will pay the employee a total of $90,000 for back pay, accrued interest and compensatory damages.  This matter was based on a referral from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s Philadelphia Area Office, which completed the initial investigation of the facts. 

“Firing an employee because of a disability in these circumstances constitutes discrimination and violates the ADA,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Tom Wheeler of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.  “Just because an employee’s disability prevents them from working in one position does not disqualify them from working successfully in a different position.  We commend the city of Philadelphia for agreeing to revise its policies and offering to reinstate the former employee.”  

For more information on the Civil Rights Division, please visit www.justice.gov/crt.  For more information on the Civil Rights Division’s Disability Rights Section, please call the department’s toll-free ADA Information Line at 800-514-0301 (TDD 800-514-0383) or visit www.ada.gov.

FALLS CHURCH, VA – The Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR) today announced the investiture of 12 new immigration judges. Chief Immigration Judge MaryBeth Keller presided over the investiture during a ceremony held Feb. 3, 2017, in the ceremonial courtroom of the E. Barrett Prettyman U.S. Courthouse, in Washington, D.C.

After a thorough application process, Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Victoria L. Argumedo, Steven D. Caley, Ila C. Deiss, Delia I. Gonzalez, Deborah K. Goodwin, Stephanie E. Gorman, Richard A. Jamadar, Julie Nelson, Emmett D. Soper, Jem C. Sponzo, Arwen Ann Swink, and Veronica S. Villegas to their new positions.

“On Jan. 8, 2017, we welcomed these 12 appointees to our growing immigration judge corps,” said Keller. “With this investment, EOIR has for the first time in its history exceeded 300 immigration judges. The agency recognizes that we must continue hiring immigration judges in order to address the pending caseload.”

Biographical information follows.

Victoria L. Argumedo, Immigration Judge, San Francisco Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Victoria L. Argumedo to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Argumedo earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1995 from the University of Vermont and a Juris Doctor in 2000 from the Golden Gate University School of Law. From 2012 to January 2017, she was in private practice at Argumedo Garzon Law Group, in San Francisco. From 2010 through 2012, she was in private practice at Surowitz & Argumedo, in San Francisco. From 2002 through 2010, she was in private practice at the Law Office of Victoria L. Argumedo, in San Francisco. From 2001 through 2002, she was an associate attorney at the Law Offices of Walter R. Pineda, in Redwood City, Calif. From May 2001 to September 2001, she served as a contract attorney for the Law Office of Enrique Ramirez, in San Francisco. From February 2001 to May 2001, she served as a contract attorney for Minami, Lew & Tamaki. Judge Argumedo is a member of the State Bar of California.

Steven D. Caley, Immigration Judge, Aurora Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Steven D. Caley to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Caley earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1977 from Hanover College and a Juris Doctor in 1980 from the New York University School of Law. From 2012 to January 2017, he served as a senior attorney for GreenLaw, in Atlanta. From 2000 through 2012, he was a partner and senior associate for Weissman, Nowack, Curry & Wilco, in Atlanta. From 2005 through 2006, and previously from 1996 through 1999, he served part-time as a special assistant administrative law judge for the Office of State Administrative Hearings, in Atlanta. From 1998 through 2000, he served as regional director for Legal Aid Services of Oregon, in Portland, Ore. From 1990 through 1998, he served as director of litigation for the Atlanta Legal Aid Society Inc., in Atlanta. From 1980 through 1990, he served in various capacities for the Legal Services Corporation of Alabama, in Dotham, Ala., including as managing attorney, senior staff attorney, and staff attorney. From 2003 through 2007, he served on the faculty of the Georgia State University College of Law as an adjunct professor. Judge Caley is a member of the Alabama State Bar, Florida Bar, State Bar of Georgia, and Oregon State Bar.

Ila C. Deiss, Immigration Judge, San Francisco Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Ila C. Deiss to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Deiss earned Bachelor of Arts degrees in 1991 from the University of California at Davis, a Master of Public Administration in 1996 from the New York University Robert F. Wagner Graduate School for Public Service, and a Juris Doctor in 1999 from the City University of New York School of Law. From 2005 to January 2017, she served as an assistant U.S. attorney for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Northern District of California, Department of Justice (DOJ), in San Francisco. From 2003 through 2005, she served as a staff attorney for the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. From 2001 through 2002, she served as a senior court counsel for the Supreme Court of the Republic of Palau. From April 2001 to August 2001, she served as a judicial law clerk for the Honorable Richard M. Berman, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. From 1999 through 2001, she served as a judicial law clerk for the Staff Attorney’s Office, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Judge Deiss is a member of the Connecticut and New York state bars.

Delia I. Gonzalez, Immigration Judge, Harlingen Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Delia I. Gonzalez to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Gonzalez earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1993 from the University of Houston and a Juris Doctor in 2001 from the Texas Southern University Thurgood Marshall School of Law. From 2006 through 2016, she served as an assistant chief counsel for the Office of the Chief Counsel, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security. From 2001 through 2006, she served as a trial attorney for the Antitrust Division, Department of Justice, entering on duty through the Attorney General’s Honors Program. Judge Gonzalez is a member of the State Bar of Texas.

Deborah K. Goodwin, Immigration Judge, Miami Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Deborah K. Goodwin to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Goodwin earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1986 from Wilson College and a Juris Doctor in 2000 from the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Law. From 2015 to January 2017, she served as an associate legal advisor for the District Court Litigation Division, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), in Washington, D.C. From 2007 through 2015, she served as an associate counsel for U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, DHS, in San Francisco. From 2002 through 2007, she served as an assistant chief counsel for ICE, DHS, in San Francisco. Judge Goodwin is a member of the Florida Bar.

Stephanie E. Gorman, Immigration Judge, Houston Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Stephanie E. Gorman to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Gorman earned a Bachelor of Science degree in 1996 from California State University Sacramento, a Juris Doctor in 2002 from the Thomas Jefferson School of Law, and a Master of Laws degree in 2005 from the University of San Diego School of Law. From 2014 to January 2017, she served as an attorney and legal instructor at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center in Glynco, Ga., for the Office of the Chief Counsel, Customs and Border Protection, Department of Homeland Security (DHS). From 2008 through 2014, she served as an assistant chief counsel for the Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, DHS. From 2009 through 2012, she also served as a special assistant U.S. attorney for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Middle District of Florida, Department of Justice (DOJ), in Orlando, Fla. From 2007 through 2008, she served as a judicial law clerk for the Honorable M. James Lorenz, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California, in San Diego. From March 2007 to September 2007, she served as a judicial law clerk for the Honorable Roger T. Benitez, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California, in San Diego. From 2006 through 2007, she served as an assistant state attorney for the Twelfth Judicial Circuit, in Sarasota, Fla. From 2003 through 2006, she served in various capacities on the faculty of the Thomas Jefferson School of Law, including as visiting assistant professor of law and senior legal writing instructor and adjunct professor. From 2002 through 2004, she served as an associate attorney for the Law Office of Matthew P. Rocco, in Carlsbad, Ca. Judge Gorman is a member of the State Bar of California and the Florida Bar.

Richard A. Jamadar, Immigration Judge, Houston Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Richard A. Jamadar to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Jamadar earned a Bachelor of Laws degree in 1987 from the University of the West Indies Faculty of Law and a Juris Doctor in 1996 from the Washington University School of Law. From 2004 to January 2017, he served as an assistant chief counsel for the Office of the Chief Counsel, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, in Orlando, Fla. During this time, from 2011 through 2013, he served as a special assistant U.S. attorney for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Middle District of Florida, Department of Justice, in Orlando, Fla. From 2003 through 2004, he served as a senior attorney for the Department of Children and Families, Tenth Judicial Circuit, in Bartow, Fla. From 1999 through 2002, he served as an assistant state attorney for the State Attorney’s Office, Ninth Judicial Circuit, in Orlando, Fla. From 1996 through 1998, he served as an associate attorney for Polatsek and Scalfani, in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Judge Jamadar is a member of the Florida Bar.

Julie Nelson, Immigration Judge, San Francisco Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Julie Nelson to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Nelson earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 2003 from Biola University and a Juris Doctor in 2006 from California Western School of Law. From December 2014 to January 2017, and previously from 2009 through May 2014, she served as an assistant chief counsel for the Office of the Principal Legal Advisor, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security, in Eloy, Az. From June 2014 to November 2014, she served as a judicial law clerk for the Honorable Steven P. Logan, U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona. From 2008 through 2009, she served as an attorney advisor for the Los Angeles Immigration Court, Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), DOJ. From 2007 through 2008, she served as a judicial law clerk for the San Diego Immigration Court, EOIR, DOJ, entering on duty through the Attorney General’s Honors Program. From 2007 through 2009, she served on the faculty of Biola University as an adjunct professor. Judge Nelson is a member of State Bar of California.

Emmett D. Soper, Immigration Judge, Arlington Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Emmett D. Soper to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Soper earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1998 from Carleton College and a Juris Doctor in 2005 from the University of Oregon School of Law. From 2012 to January 2017, he served as an associate general counsel for the Office of the General Counsel, Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), Department of Justice (DOJ), in Falls Church, Va. From 2010 through 2012, he served as an attorney advisor for the Office of Legal Policy, DOJ, in Washington, D.C. From 2006 through 2010, he served as an attorney advisor for the Office of the Chief Immigration Judge, EOIR, DOJ, in Falls Church, Va. From 2005 through 2006, he served as a judicial law clerk for the Buffalo Immigration Court, EOIR, DOJ. Judge Soper is a member of the Oregon State Bar.

Jem C. Sponzo, Immigration Judge, New York City Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Jem C. Sponzo to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Sponzo earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 2003 from Hamilton College and a Juris Doctor in 2006 from the University of Connecticut School of Law. From 2007 to January 2017, she served as a trial attorney for the Civil Division, Office of Immigration Litigation, Department of Justice (DOJ), in Washington, D.C. From January 2015 to July 2015, she also served as a clearance counsel for the Office of Presidential Personnel, White House, Executive Office of the President of the United States. From 2006 through 2007, she served as a judicial law clerk for the New York City Immigration Court, Executive Office for Immigration Review, DOJ, entering on duty through the Attorney General’s Honors Program. Judge Sponzo is a member of the New York State Bar.

Arwen Ann Swink, Immigration Judge, San Francisco Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Arwen Ann Swink to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Swink earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 2002 from California State University San Marcos and a Juris Doctor in 2006 from the University of California Hastings College Of Law. Prior to this post, she served as a staff attorney in the motions unit of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, beginning in 2010. From 2006 through 2010, she served as an associate attorney for the Law Office of Robert B. Jobe, in San Francisco. Judge Swink is a member of the State Bar of California.

Veronica S. Villegas, Immigration Judge, Los Angeles Immigration Court

Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch appointed Veronica S. Villegas to begin hearing cases in February 2017. Judge Villegas earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1996 from California State University Fullerton and a Juris Doctor in 1999 from the Loyola Law School. From 2012 to January 2017, and previously from 2004 through 2005, she was in private practice at the Law Office of Veronica S. Villegas, in West Covina, Calif. From 2005 through 2012, she was a partner at Hill, Piibe & Villegas, in West Covina, Calif. From 2003 through 2004, she served as an assistant chief counsel for the Office of the Chief Counsel, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Department of Homeland Security. From 1999 through 2003, she served as an assistant district counsel for the former Office of the District Counsel, Immigration and Naturalization Service, Department of Justice. Judge Villegas is a member of the State Bar of California.