District Not Recorded

A federal jury convicted certified public accountant Jeffery Deshon Applewhite, aka Jeffrey Donald Mason, a resident of Los Angeles County, California, of 20 counts of aiding and assisting the preparation and presentation of false tax returns late yesterday, announced Assistant Attorney General Kathryn Keneally of the Justice Department’s Tax Division, U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag for the Northern District of California and Internal Revenue Service (IRS)-Criminal Investigation Special Agent in Charge José M. Martinez.  Applewhite was not convicted on five charges of identity fraud.

The evidence presented during the five day trial before U.S. District Court Judge Jeffrey S. White showed that Applewhite, who owned and operated tax preparation businesses in Los Angeles and Oakland, California, prepared false and fraudulent income tax returns for clients during the years 2006 through 2011 on which he fabricated deductible expenses, including gifts to charity,  and other expenses.  Applewhite also fraudulently included residential energy credits and education credits to which his clients were not entitled on tax returns he prepared.  Applewhite prepared and filed false returns using the names Jeffery Deshon Applewhite and Jeffrey Donald Mason, and used the name and tax preparer identification number of another tax return preparer.

Applewhite’s sentencing hearing is scheduled for Aug. 5, 2014, before Judge White in Oakland.  The maximum statutory penalty for each count of aiding and assisting the preparation of false tax returns is three years in prison and a fine of $250,000. 

The case was investigated by Special Agents from IRS - Criminal Investigation .  Assistant U.S. Attorney Cynthia Stier and Trial Attorney Sonia Owens of the Tax Division are prosecuting the case.

More information about the Tax Division and its enforcement efforts can be found at the division website

Perry Sylvester Jackson, 28, of Marysville, Calif., was sentenced today by U.S. District Court Judge John A. Mendez to serve 70 months in prison for violating the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act in a 2011 racially motivated attack against a white man and an African-American woman in Marysville.  Jackson, who previously pleaded guilty on Dec. 17, 2013, was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release following his prison sentence and to pay restitution in the amount of $175.  Co-defendant Billy James Hammett, who also pleaded guilty, was sentenced on March 25, 2014, to serve 87 months in prison and three years of supervised release, as well as to pay $175 in restitution.  Anthony Merrell Tyler, 33, also pleaded guilty and is awaiting sentencing.

According to documents filed with the court, around 10:45 p.m. on April 18, 2011, a white man and an African-American woman parked their car at a convenience store in Marysville.  Shortly afterward, the three defendants attacked the man and woman based on race.  After calling the male victim a “[racial slur]-lover,” Jackson, who has the words “white power” tattooed on his legs, punched him twice in the head through the open passenger window.  At the same time, Hammett kicked the woman in the chest.  A few seconds later, Tyler smashed the car’s windshield with a crowbar.  As the attack continued, the woman managed to take refuge inside the convenience store.  All three assailants then descended upon the male victim and began attacking him in the parking lot.  He sustained abrasions on his right forearm and knees, while the woman suffered bruising to her chest.  At the end of the incident, Tyler used a racial slur to refer to an African-American witness.

Tyler is scheduled to be sentenced on July 8, 2014, where he faces a statutory maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a fine of up to $250,000. 

This case was investigated by the FBI.  The case is being prosecuted by U.S. Attorney Benjamin B. Wagner for the Eastern District of California and Trial Attorney Chiraag Bains of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

Harvey James was sentenced today to serve 110 months in prison for his role in a stolen identity refund fraud scheme, announced Assistant Attorney General Kathryn Keneally of the Justice Department's Tax Division and U.S. Attorney George L. Beck Jr. for the Middle District of Alabama.  James previously pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft on Oct. 25, 2013.  James was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release and to pay $618,042 in restitution.

Between January 2010 and 2012, James and his sister, Jacqueline Slaton, obtained stolen identities from various individuals, including one person who had access to inmate information from the Alabama Department of Corrections.  James and others used those inmate names to file federal and state tax returns that claimed fraudulent refunds.  James directed some of the false refunds to prepaid debit cards, and directed others to be issued in the form of a Treasury check.  Vernon Harrison, a U.S. Postal Service employee, provided James with addresses from his postal route, which were used as mailing addresses for the fraudulent prepaid debit cards and state tax refund checks.  Harrison collected the debit cards and checks and provided them to another individual, who in turn gave them to James and Slaton.  In total, James filed over 1,000 federal and state income tax returns that claimed over $1 million in fraudulent tax refunds.  Slaton was sentenced to serve 70 months in jail, and Harrison was sentenced to serve 111 months in jail.

The case was investigated by Special Agents of the IRS - Criminal Investigation.  Trial Attorneys Jason H. Poole and Michael Boteler of the Justice Department’s Tax Division and Assistant U.S. Attorney Todd Brown prosecuted the case.

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

A high-level international meeting to support the Government of Ukraine in recovering stolen assets begins tomorrow in London. The gathering is a landmark for Ukraine in underscoring the rule of law and international cooperation. The international community and the Government of Ukraine are united in their commitment and determination in returning stolen assets to the people of Ukraine.

The Ukraine Forum on Asset Recovery (UFAR) is jointly organized by the United Kingdom and the United States of America in support of efforts by the Government of Ukraine to recover stolen assets. Asset recovery is essential in stopping those who have stolen assets from benefitting from their crimes, and in sending a strong message that there can be no impunity for those who carry out such illegal actions. The two-day meeting brings together representatives of key international financial centers and international organizations to bolster collective action, foster direct exchange between practitioners and plan practical steps towards this goal. Key objectives include:

• Reaffirming the political commitment of the international community in tracing and recovering stolen assets; • Facilitating international cooperation for the early tracing of such assets; • Enabling  sharing of best practices, lessons learned and available tools; • Addressing ways of tracing assets hidden behind complex corporate structures; • Facilitating networking and trust-building among practitioners across jurisdictions; and
• Identifying specific capacity building needs for Ukraine.

Senior government officials alongside policy makers, judicial experts, prosecutors, financial intelligence analysts, and regulators are participating in UFAR. Bilateral meetings between Ukrainian officials and other delegations will be an important feature of UFAR in helping to identify concrete actions to be taken to advance asset recovery.

Attorney General Eric Holder of the United States, which is jointly organizing UFAR, emphasized the importance of asset recovery in bringing justice and in mobilizing against corruption.

“This community of nations stands united in our determination to support Ukrainian leaders and citizens as they combat corruption and strive to ensure the stability, the independence, and the national sovereignty of a strong and free Ukraine. 

“We know that the costs of corruption can be immense and long-lasting.  That is why, within days of the fall of President Yanukovych’s regime, the U.S. Department of Justice had a response team on the ground in Kyiv to assess the needs of Ukraine’s investigation into any stolen assets belonging to its people; to provide assistance with document review and preservation; and to help initiate and coordinate any and all efforts required by further investigations. 

“The United States will never stop fighting alongside Ukraine and its partners to ensure accountability, to strengthen transnational cooperation, and to meet instability with resolve – and robust diplomacy.”

In hosting UFAR in London, the British Home Secretary, the Right Hon. Theresa May MP, stressed the importance of the international community’s role in assisting Ukraine.

“By taking urgent and immediate steps to provide political and economic stability, the UK, US and wider international community has already demonstrated a strong commitment to the people of Ukraine. This forum provides a further opportunity to show our ongoing support.

“Building on our expertise in the field of asset recovery, it will also provide practical leadership and assistance to the Ukrainian government as they identify and recover assets looted under the Yanukovych regime and introduce political and economic reform.

“The message is clear - we are making it harder than ever for corrupt regimes or individuals around the world to move, hide and profit from the proceeds of their crime.”

Dante Phearse, 33, has entered a plea of guilty to calling in a bomb threat to Congregation Beth Israel, a synagogue in Houston.  The announcement is being made jointly by the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Texas.  

Phearse pleaded guilty to the civil rights violation of threatening to bomb a synagogue and to making a telephone bomb threat.  As part of his plea, he admitted that on April 30, 2013, he willfully obstructed members of Congregation Beth Israel from enjoying the free exercise of their religious beliefs by threat of force with an explosive device.  Phearse also admitted to using an instrument of interstate commerce to communicate a threat to kill and injure people and to destroy a building by means of an explosive device.  

As a result of the above threats, the school at Congregation Beth Israel was closed for a day and extra security was hired to guard the synagogue and school, thus obstructing the synagogues’ members in the enjoyment of the free exercise of their religious beliefs.

U.S. District Judge Kenneth M. Hoyt accepted the plea today and has sentencing for July 7, 2014.  At that time, Phearse faces a sentence of up to 20 years in federal prison for the civil rights violation and a maximum sentence of 10 years for making bomb threats over the telephone.   

The FBI investigated the case with the assistance of the Houston Police Department. Civil Rights Division Trial Attorneys Nicholas Murphy and Saeed Mody and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Ruben Perez and Joe Magliolo are prosecuting in cooperation with the Harris County District Attorney’s Office.

A Dominican national was sentenced today for his role in trafficking the identities and corresponding identity documents of Puerto Rican U.S. citizens.

Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Rosa E. Rodríguez-Vélez of the District of Puerto Rico, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary Thomas S. Winkowski of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Chief Postal Inspector Guy J. Cottrell of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service (USPIS), Director Gregory B. Starr of the U.S. State Department’s Diplomatic Security Service (DSS) and Chief Richard Weber of the Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation (IRS-CI) made the announcement.

Jorge Luis “Daniel” Mendez, 38, a Dominican national formerly of San Juan, Puerto Rico, was sentenced to serve 75 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, and ordered to forfeit $422,793 in illegal proceeds by U.S. District Judge Juan M. Pérez-Giménez in the District of Puerto Rico. The defendant is illegally within the United States and the government will seek his deportation following the service of his prison sentence.

On Dec. 3, 2013, Mendez pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit identification fraud, one count of conspiracy to commit human smuggling for financial gain and three counts of aggravated identity theft. To date, 53 individuals have been charged for their roles in the identity trafficking scheme. All 49 arrested defendants have pleaded guilty and 45 defendants have been sentenced.

According to court documents, individuals located in the Savarona area of Caguas, Puerto Rico, obtained Puerto Rican identities and corresponding identity documents. Other conspirators located in various cities throughout the United States solicited customers and sold Social Security cards and corresponding Puerto Rico birth certificates for prices ranging from $700 to $2,500 per set. The identity brokers in the United States ordered the identity documents from the document suppliers in Savarona on behalf of their customers by making coded telephone calls. The conspirators were charged with using text messages, money transfer services and express, priority or regular U.S. mail to complete their illicit transactions.

The court documents indicate that some of the conspirators assumed a Puerto Rican identity themselves and used that identity in connection with the trafficking operation. Their customers generally obtained the identity documents to assume the identity of Puerto Rican U.S. citizens and to obtain additional identification documents, such as legitimate state driver’s licenses. Some customers obtained the documents to commit financial fraud and attempted to obtain a U.S. passport.

Mendez was a supplier of Puerto Rican identity documents who operated in San Juan and provided Puerto Rican identities to brokers in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania, knowing that the identities would be sold to undocumented aliens who would then pose as U.S. citizens. Court documents show that Mendez was a manager and supervisor in the conspiracy.

Various identity brokers were operating in Rockford, DeKalb and Aurora, Ill.; Seymour, Columbus and Indianapolis, Ind.; Hartford, Conn.; Clewiston, Fla.; Lilburn and Norcross, Ga.; Salisbury, Md.; Columbus and Fairfield, Ohio; Dorchester, Lawrence, Salem and Worcester, Mass.; Grand Rapids, Mich.; Nebraska City, Neb.; Elizabeth, N.J.; Burlington and Hickory, N.C.; Hazelton and Philadelphia, Pa.; Houston; Abingdon and Albertville, Ala.; and Providence, R.I.

The charges are the result of Operation Island Express, an ongoing, nationally coordinated investigation led by the ICE Homeland Security Investigations’ (ICE-HSI) Chicago Office and USPIS, DSS and IRS-CI offices in Chicago, in coordination with the ICE-HSI San Juan Office and the DSS Resident Office in Puerto Rico. The Illinois Secretary of State Police; Elgin, Ill., Police Department; Seymour, Ind., Police Department; and Indiana State Police provided substantial assistance. The ICE-HSI Assistant Attaché office in the Dominican Republic and International Organized Crime Intelligence and Operations Center (IOC-2) as well as various ICE, USPIS, DSS and IRS-CI offices around the country provided invaluable support.

The case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorneys James S. Yoon, Hope S. Olds, Courtney B. Schaefer and Christina Giffin of the Criminal Division’s Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section, with the assistance of the Criminal Division’s Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section and the support of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Puerto Rico. The U.S. Attorney’s Offices in the Northern District of Illinois, Southern District of Indiana, District of Connecticut, District of Massachusetts, District of Nebraska, Middle District of North Carolina, Southern District of Ohio, Middle District of Pennsylvania, District of Rhode Island, Southern District of Texas and Western District of Virginia provided substantial assistance.

Potential victims and the public may obtain information about the case at: www.justice.gov/criminal/vns/caseup/beltrerj.html . Anyone who believes their identity may have been compromised in relation to this investigation may contact the ICE toll-free hotline at 1-866-DHS-2ICE (1-866-347-2423) and its online tip form at www.ice.gov/tipline . Anyone who may have information about particular crimes in this case should also report them to the ICE tip line or website.

Anyone who believes that they have been a victim of identity theft, or wants information about preventing identity theft, may obtain helpful information and complaint forms on various government websites including the Federal Trade Commission ID Theft Website, www.ftc.gov/idtheft . Additional resources regarding identity theft can be found at www.ojp.usdoj.gov/ovc/pubs/ID_theft/idtheft.html ; www.ssa.gov/pubs/10064.html ; www.fbi.gov/about-us/investigate/cyber/identity_theft ; and www.irs.gov/privacy/article/0,,id=186436,00.html .

Noting that African-American and Hispanic males are arrested at disproportionately high rates, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder said Monday that the Justice Department will seek to collect data about stops, searches and arrests as part of a larger effort to analyze and reduce the possible effect of bias within the criminal justice system.

Attorney General Holder said the project grew out of President Obama’s call, issued last July following the verdict in the Trayvon Martin case, for the Justice Department to seek to reduce tensions between law enforcement and minority communities.

“Racial disparities contribute to tension in our nation generally and within communities of color specifically, and tend to breed resentment towards law enforcement that is counterproductive to the goal of reducing crime,” Attorney General Holder said. “Of course, to be successful in reducing both the experience and the perception of bias, we must have verifiable data about the problem.  As a key part of this initiative, we will work with grant recipients and local law enforcement to collect data about stops and searches, arrests, and case outcomes in order to help assess the impact of possible bias.”

The data collection is one part of the Department’s new National Center for Building Community Trust and Justice. It will be funded through $4.75 million in competitively awarded grants. The grant recipients will be named later this year.
 
        The complete text of the Attorney General’s video message is below:

“A recent study reported that half of African-American men have been arrested at least once by age 23.  Overall, black men were 6 times, and Latino men were 2.5 times, more likely to be imprisoned than white men in 2012.
 
“This overrepresentation of young men of color in our criminal justice system is a problem we must confront—not only as an issue of individual responsibility but also as one of fundamental fairness, and as an issue of effective law enforcement.  Racial disparities contribute to tension in our nation generally and within communities of color specifically, and tend to breed resentment towards law enforcement that is counterproductive to the goal of reducing crime.
 
“We know – from research and from experience – that when people are treated fairly by police and other justice system agencies they are more likely to accept decisions by the authorities and obey the law in the future, even when they are penalized by criminal sanctions. 
 
“Last July, following the verdict in the case involving the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, President Obama spoke out about the need to promote better understanding between law enforcement and young men of color.  He specifically directed the Justice Department to work closely with state and local law enforcement agencies to develop training and other innovative tools that can help to reduce discord and restore trust.
 
“We are heeding the President’s call.  This month, the Justice Department is launching a new initiative – the National Center for Building Community Trust and Justice – to analyze and reduce the effect of racial bias within the criminal justice system.  The Center will be funded through an initial competitive grant award totaling $4.75 million and is jointly supported by the Justice Department’s Office of Justice Programs, the COPS Office, the Civil Rights Division, the Office on Violence Against Women, and the Community Relations Service.  This effort will encompass a broad range of areas in which fairness and trust can come into question–from stops and searches to wrongful convictions.
 
“Of course, to be successful in reducing both the experience and the perception of bias, we must have verifiable data about the problem.  As a key part of this initiative, we will work with grant recipients and local law enforcement to collect data about stops and searches, arrests, and case outcomes in order to help assess the impact of possible bias.  We will conduct this research while simultaneously implementing strategies in five initial pilot sites with the goal of reducing the role of bias and building confidence in the justice system among young people of color.  This work will likely include anti-gang and mentoring projects intended to empower young African-American and Latino males and break the vicious cycle of poverty, incarceration, and crime that destroys too many promising futures each and every day. 
 
“Through partnerships with community organizations and local agencies, the Center will build on the work of the Department’s Smart on Crime initiative to help expand opportunity in neighborhoods that are too often characterized by distress and distrust; to reduce bias and discord; and – ultimately – to relegate the era of animosity and suspicion to the past.
 
“Of course, I realize that progress will not come easily, and the changes we seek will not take hold overnight.  But the Justice Department is firmly committed to the goal of opening doors to cooperation and trust that will ultimately lead to safer and healthier communities.
 
“The Department of Justice is integrally involved in the President’s initiative, “My Brother’s Keeper,” a plan to make sure that every young man of color who is willing to work hard and play by the rules has the chance to reach his full potential.  By creating more opportunities for young men of color we can send the message that our country is stronger when all Americans are doing well.
 
“As our nation’s Attorney General, and as a father of three, I am personally dedicated to doing everything possible to reduce crime, to strengthen our communities, and to provide the support and assistance that all of our young people need – and that they deserve.”

The full video message is available at http://www.justice.gov/agwa.php. 

A soldier in the Texas Army National Guard pleaded guilty today for his role in a bribery and fraud scheme that caused more than $30,000 in losses to the U.S. National Guard Bureau, announced Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney Kenneth Magidson of the Southern District of Texas.

Sergeant First Class Zaunmine O. Duncan, 38, formerly of Austin, Texas, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy, one count of bribery and one count of aggravated identity theft. The case against Duncan arises from an investigation involving allegations that former and current military recruiters and U.S. soldiers in the San Antonio and Houston areas engaged in a wide-ranging corruption scheme to illegally obtain fraudulent recruiting bonuses. To date, the investigation has led to charges against 25 individuals, 23 of whom have pleaded guilty.

According to court documents, in approximately September 2005, the National Guard Bureau entered into a contract with Document and Packaging Broker Inc. (Docupak), to administer the Guard Recruiting Assistance Program (G-RAP). The G-RAP was a recruiting program that offered monetary incentives to soldiers of the Army National Guard who referred others to join the Army National Guard. Through this program, a participating soldier could receive bonus payments for referring another individual to join the Army National Guard. Based on certain milestones achieved by the referred soldier, a participating soldier would receive payment through direct deposit into the participating soldier’s designated bank account. To participate in the program, soldiers were required to create online recruiting assistant accounts.

Duncan admitted that between approximately February 2008 and August 2010, while he was a recruiter for the National Guard, he obtained the names and Social Security numbers of potential soldiers and provided them to recruiting assistants, including co-conspirators Elisha Ceja, Annika Chambers, Kimberly Hartgraves and Lashae Hawkins, so that these recruiting assistants could use the information to obtain fraudulent recruiting bonuses by falsely claiming that they were responsible for referring these potential soldiers to join the Army National Guard, when they were not. In exchange for the information, Duncan admitted that he personally received a total of at least approximately $24,500 in payments from Ceja, Chambers, Hartgraves and Hawkins.

Duncan is scheduled to be sentenced on Aug. 28, 2014, before U.S. District Judge Lee H. Rosenthal in Houston.

Co-conspirators Ceja, Chambers, Hartgraves and Hawkins have all pleaded guilty to conspiracy and bribery in connection to this scheme. Hartgraves is scheduled to be sentenced on June 24, 2014. Ceja, Chambers and Hawkins are each scheduled to be sentenced on June 26, 2014. All of these sentencing hearings are set before U.S. District Judge Rosenthal in Houston.

The cases are being investigated by special agents from the San Antonio Fraud Resident Agency of Army CID’s Major Procurement Fraud Unit. This case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorneys Sean F. Mulryne, Heidi Boutros Gesch and Mark J. Cipolletti of the Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney John Pearson of the Southern District of Texas.

Habtom Merhay, a national of Eritrea and a citizen of the United Kingdom, made his initial appearance today in Washington, D.C., federal court to face human smuggling charges for his role in smuggling primarily Eritrean and Ethiopian undocumented migrants from Dubai, United Arab Emirates, through South and Central America and Mexico into the United States.

Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Ronald C. Machen Jr. of the District of Columbia and Acting Special Agent in Charge Katrina W. Berger of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) made the announcement.

Merhay, 47, arrived in the United States on April 25, 2014, and made his initial appearance today before U.S. Magistrate Judge Deborah A. Robinson in the District of Columbia. He was indicted under seal in the District of Columbia in 2012, and the charges were unsealed today. Merhay has been in the custody of Moroccan authorities pending extradition since his arrest in Marrakech, Morocco, in August 2013.

The indictment charges Merhay with one count of conspiracy to bring undocumented migrants to the United States for profit and 15 counts of unlawfully bringing an undocumented migrant to the United States for profit. Court documents allege that Merhay operated with a network of smugglers in Africa, the United Arab Emirates, South and Central America, Mexico and elsewhere to coordinate and implement arrangements, including providing fraudulent identity and travel documents, for undocumented migrants to travel through Latin America and ultimately into the United States without authorization. For up to $15,000, Merhay arranged for individual undocumented migrants to travel from points in Africa to a house or apartment in Dubai, where he provided travel documents, tickets and instructions for meeting other smugglers while on the way to the United States. Merhay coordinated the migrants’ air travel to South America, where they would meet with Merhay’s associates, who would direct or guide them across the various country borders. The undocumented migrants then met with other smugglers associated with Merhay and were further guided north to Mexico and then into the United States, sometimes by crossing the Rio Grande River by raft.

The investigation was conducted under the Extraterritorial Criminal Travel Strike Force (ECT) program, a joint partnership between the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and ICE-HSI. The ECT program focuses on human smuggling networks that may present particular national security or public safety risks or present grave humanitarian concerns. ECT has dedicated investigative, intelligence and prosecutorial resources. ECT coordinates and receives assistance from other U.S. government agencies and foreign law enforcement authorities.

The investigation was conducted by HSI Washington.  This case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorney Jay Bauer of the Criminal Division’s Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Frederick Yette of the District of Columbia.  The extradition was handled by Dan E. Stigall of the Criminal Division’s Office of International Affairs.

The Department of Justice and HSI expressed their appreciation for the significant assistance provided by the Moroccan Ministry of Justice.

The charges contained in the indictment are merely accusations, and the defendant is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.

The Justice Department’s Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) today announced the release of two grant solicitations to launch a new $3 million special initiative for the Bakken Region.  Located in western North Dakota and eastern Montana, the Bakken region has experienced rapid growth in oil and gas production in recent years.  It has also seen increases in population and crime.  OVW’s Bakken Region Initiative will support the expansion of services to victims of sexual assault, domestic violence and stalking as well as aid the local criminal justice system in responding to these crimes.

 
“Over the past five years, we have made great strides in protecting women from violence in Indian country,” said Associate Attorney General Tony West.  “We will continue to partner with tribal and local law enforcement and service providers, and together we will help strengthen public safety in the Bakken communities with resources like these grants.”

 
Supported by funding from OVW’s Rural Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence, Dating Violence and Stalking Grant Assistance Program (Rural Program), the OVW Bakken Region Initiative will support projects that are designed to address the unique challenges faced by victims, responders and service providers within this rural region.  The Bakken Region Initiative was developed through a collaborative process resulting from OVW’s July 2013 fact-finding trip to the region, during which OVW leadership met with local and tribal advocates and law enforcement, tribal leaders, the U.S. Attorney, FBI agents and victim service staff.  In response, OVW developed two solicitations, the Violence Against Women Bakken Region Initiative: Tribal Special Assistant U.S. Attorney (Bakken Region Tribal SAUSA Initiative) and the Violence Against Women Bakken Region Initiative: Enhanced Response to Victims (Bakken Region Enhanced Response to Victims Initiative).  Together, these grants will create dedicated resources to increase local and tribal capacity to prosecute crimes of violence against women and provide services to victims of sexual assault, domestic violence and stalking.

 
“Local and tribal victim service providers have been overwhelmed with the increase in domestic violence and sexual assault victims coming forward and needing help,” said Bea Hanson, OVW’s Principal Deputy Director.  “These targeted funds will enable the community to assist more victims and support the growing population in the Bakken Region.” 

The Bakken Region Tribal SAUSA Initiative will support the salary, travel and training costs of a Tribal SAUSA for the Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes of the Fort Peck Indian Reservation in Montana and a Tribal SAUSA for the Three Affiliated Tribes of the Fort Berthold Indian Reservation in North Dakota.  The Tribal SAUSAs, who will be cross-designated to bring cases in both tribal and federal courts, will work in collaboration with the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices in the Districts of Montana and North Dakota.  These prosecutors will maintain an active violence against women crimes caseload in tribal and federal courts, while also helping to promote higher quality investigations, improved training and better inter-governmental communication.

The Bakken Region Enhanced Response to Victims Initiative will fund state domestic violence and sexual assault coalitions, as well as local and tribal victim service providers responding to the increased demand for domestic violence and sexual assault victim services.  Funding and technical assistance will also help those working to prevent violence and support survivors of sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence and stalking. 

The solicitations are non-competitive special initiative announcements, and applications for both solicitations are due by May 28, 2014.

Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer in charge of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division made the following statement today after the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia found the department’s settlement involving US Airways Group Inc. and American Airlines’ parent corporation, AMR Corp., to be in the public interest:

 
“We’re pleased that the court agreed that the department’s remedy will enhance system-wide competition in the airline industry.  By increasing the presence of low cost carriers at key constrained airports across the country–through significant divestitures of slots at Ronald Reagan Washington National and New York LaGuardia International and gates at five other important airports–consumers will have more choices to fly at more competitive airfares.  History has shown that when low cost carriers have entered the market, consumers benefit.  With the settlement, the department is requiring an unprecedented number of divestitures in this industry that will provide enhanced competition across the nation.” 

Background

 
On Aug. 13, 2013, the department, six state attorneys general and the District of Columbia filed an antitrust lawsuit against US Airways and American alleging that US Airway’s $11 billion acquisition of American would have substantially lessened competition for commercial air travel in local markets throughout the United States.  The department alleged that the transaction would result in passengers paying higher airfares and receiving less service.  In addition, the department alleged that the transaction would entrench the merged airline as the dominant carrier at Reagan National, where it would control 69 percent of take-off and landing slots, thus effectively foreclosing entry or expansion by competing airlines.

 
On Nov. 12, 2013, the department announced its settlement requiring US Airways and American’s parent corporation, AMR Corp. to divest slots and gates at key constrained airports across the country to low cost carrier airlines (LCCs) in order to enhance system-wide competition in the airline industry.

The settlement requires US Airways and American to divest slots, gates and ground facilities at key airports around the country.  Specifically, the settlement requires the companies to divest or transfer to low cost carrier purchasers approved by the department:

• All 104 air carrier slots (i.e. slots not reserved for use only by smaller, commuter planes) at Reagan National and rights and interest in other facilities at the airport necessary to support the use of the slots;
• Thirty-four slots at LaGuardia and rights and interest in other facilities at the airport necessary to support the use of the slots; and
• Rights and interests to two airport gates and associated ground facilities at each of  Boston Logan, Chicago O’Hare, Dallas Love Field, Los Angeles International and Miami International.

Thus far, slots at Reagan National were divested to Southwest Airlines, JetBlue and Virgin America.  At LaGuardia, slots were divested to Southwest Airlines and Virgin America.  The divestiture process for the gates at the other airports is ongoing.

The International Competition Network (ICN) adopted new recommended practices for predatory pricing analysis and competition assessment, and approved new work product on international merger enforcement cooperation, confidentiality protections during investigations, leniency policy and digital evidence gathering, the Department of Justice announced today.

 
The 13th annual ICN conference, hosted by the Moroccan Competition Council, was held on April 23-25, 2014, in Marrakesh, Morocco. More than 500 delegates from 90 jurisdictions participated, including competition experts from international organizations and the legal, business, consumer and academic communities. Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Chairwoman Edith Ramirez led the U.S. delegation.  The conference showcased the achievements of ICN working groups on cartels, competition advocacy, competition agency effectiveness, mergers and unilateral conduct.

 
The Department of Justice co-chairs the Cartel Working Group, which addressed the challenges of cartel enforcement, including prevention, detection, investigation and sanctioning of cartel conduct. The working group showcased revised work product focusing on the implementation of effective leniency policy and digital evidence gathering. Assistant Attorney General Baer spoke on a panel about effective cartel enforcement, highlighting the Antitrust Division’s digital evidence gathering techniques.

 
“Gathering the world’s antitrust enforcers together to discuss and share ideas on the most effective ways to combat cartel and civil anticompetitive behavior is critical to ensuring that the global marketplace remains open and competitive benefiting consumers and businesses,” said Assistant Attorney General Baer. “It is important to stay nimble and take advantage of new technology, such as the digital evidence gathering tools being used by many antitrust enforcement agencies.”

FTC Chairwoman Ramirez participated in the Merger Working Group’s plenary discussion of international cooperation in merger cases, the subject of a multi-year study by the working group. The Chairwoman highlighted that, “Our experience demonstrates that international cooperation is essential to ensure effective and consistent merger review. The ICN is a uniquely valuable forum in which to advance the coordination and sound analysis of the increasing volume of cross-border transactions.”

 
The Merger Working Group presented a report detailing agencies’ experiences with international enforcement cooperation that will inform the development of ICN guidance on effective cooperation. This initiative furthers the working group’s mission to promote the adoption of best practices in the design and operation of merger review laws.

 
To further the Unilateral Conduct Working Group’s mission to promote convergence toward sound enforcement of laws governing conduct by firms with substantial market power, the working group presented new recommended practices for predatory pricing investigations at the conference. Deputy Assistant Attorney General Renata B. Hesse of the department’s Antitrust Division participated in the working group’s plenary discussion of how agencies characterize and pursue unilateral conduct enforcement.

 
The Agency Effectiveness Working Group, co-chaired by the FTC, addresses competition agency strategy, planning, operations, and investigative tools and procedures. An ongoing working group project on agency investigative process aims to identify investigative procedures that promote fair and informed enforcement actions. Paul O’Brien, International Counsel at the FTC, moderated a plenary session on agency procedures focused on investigative transparency and engagement. This year, the working group also produced a report on confidentiality protections that underscored common approaches to these practices.

 
The Advocacy Working Group presented a set of recommended practices on competition assessment, the exercise of evaluating the effects on competition of a proposed or existing law, regulation or policy. The ICN recommendations extend and complement work by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in its Competition Assessment Toolkit, and advance the working group’s goal to promote the development of practical tools and guidance to improve the effectiveness of competition agencies’ competition advocacy activities.

 
The Moroccan Competition Council led a special project devoted to the treatment of state-owned enterprises under competition law.

 
The ICN was created in October 2001, when the Department of Justice and the FTC joined antitrust agencies from 13 other jurisdictions to increase understanding of competition policy and promote convergence toward best practices around the world.  The ICN now comprises 128 member agencies from 115 jurisdictions.

More resources are available on the ICN website.

WASHINGTON—On January 3, 2014, the Director of National Intelligence declassified and disclosed publically that the U.S. government had filed an application with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court seeking renewal of the authority to collect telephony metadata in bulk, and that, the FISC renewed that authority. The Office of the Director National Intelligence also announced that the Administration was undertaking a declassification review of the FISC's January 3 primary order. On February 12, 2014, and following a declassification review by the Executive Branch, the FISC released in redacted form the previously classified January 3 primary order it had issued in Docket Number BR 14-01, along with a number of other documents.

On January 22, 2014, following service of a Section 215 production order issued to it by the FISC in Docket Number BR 14-01, a provider petitioned the Court to "vacate, modify, or reaffirm" the production order in light of the Memorandum Opinion issued by the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in Klayman, et al., v. Obama, et al., No. 13-cv-0851 on December 16, 2013. That Memorandum Opinion held, in the context of ruling on a motion for preliminary injunction, that the plaintiffs were likely to succeed on their claim that the NSA Section 215 program authorized by orders of the FISC violated the Fourth Amendment.

On March 20, 2014, the FISC issued an Opinion and Order addressing the provider's petition. The FISC held that the district court's opinion in Klayman was unpersuasive, concluded that it provided no basis for vacating the production order, and held that Smith v. Maryland, 442 U.S. 735 (1979) is the controlling precedent. Accordingly, the FISC reaffirmed its production order and directed continued compliance on the part of the provider.

Following the completion of FISC-ordered declassification reviews by the Executive Branch, today the FISC released in redacted form the previously classified January 22, 2014, provider petition; a January 23, 2014, Scheduling Order; a February 12, 2014, Response of the United States to the provider petition; a March 20, 2014, Opinion and Order signed by the Honorable Rosemary M. Collyer, and an April 11, 2014, order. These documents are available at the FISC's website, www.uscourts.gov and on the Department of Justice’s website, www.justice.gov.
S, OPINIONS AND ORDERS REGARDING COLLECTION UNDER SECTION 501 OF THE FOREIGN INTELLIGENCE SURVEILLANCE ACT

Related Materials:

BR14-01 Opinion and Order
BR14-01 Order Regarding Unsealing
BR14-01 Order
BR14-01 Petition
BR14-01 Response
BR14-01 Scheduling Order

Nakia Jackson, of Montgomery, Alabama, was sentenced to serve 87 months in prison today for conspiring to defraud the United States and one count of aggravated identity theft for his role in a stolen identity refund fraud scheme, announced Assistant Attorney General Kathryn Keneally of the Justice Department's Tax Division, U.S. Attorney George L. Beck Jr. for the Middle District of Alabama and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

According to court documents, between January 2009 and March 2011, Jackson obtained stolen identities from an Alabama state employee and used those identities to file false tax returns.  Jackson recruited a bank employee, LaQuanta Clayton, to assist him in depositing the false income tax refunds into various bank accounts.  He obtained permission from several individuals to use their bank accounts to receive false refunds and when a false refund was deposited, Jackson would direct the individuals to withdraw the money and give the money to him.  In total, Jackson filed over 100 false tax returns and requested over $400,000 in refunds.  

In addition, Jackson was ordered to serve three years of supervised release and pay $212,856 in restitution.

IRS-Criminal Investigation agents investigated this case and Trial Attorneys Charles M. Edgar Jr. and Michael Boteler for the Tax Division and Assistant U.S. Attorney Todd Brown are prosecuting the case.

More information about the Tax Division and its enforcement efforts can be found at the division website.

The Department of Justice filed a civil forfeiture complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California seeking to recover more than $700,000 in alleged corruption proceeds of Chun Doo-hwan, the former president of the Republic of Korea.

These monies were seized in February 2014 from the sale of a house located in Newport Beach, Calif., which President Chun’s son, Chun Jae Yong, had purchased in 2005 with proceeds allegedly traceable to his father’s corruption. The United States is working with the Republic of Korea’s Supreme Prosecutor’s Office, the Ministry of Justice and the Seoul Central District Prosecutor’s Office to forfeit these corruption proceeds.

The announcement was made by Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, Assistant Director in Charge Bill L. Lewis of the FBI’s Los Angeles Division and Assistant Director John G. Connolly of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Office of International Affairs.

“While serving as Korea’s president, Chun Doo-hwan betrayed the Korean people by taking over $200 million in bribes, some of which his family members then illegally laundered into the United States,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General O’Neil. “Through the department’s Kleptocracy Initiative, we are making crystal clear that the United States will not tolerate the use of its financial system by corrupt foreign officials – or their relatives – to harbor their ill-gotten gains.”

“The U.S. will not be a safe repository for assets misappropriated by corrupt foreign leaders,” said FBI Assistant Director in Charge Lewis.  “The FBI is committed to working with foreign and domestic partners to identify and return those assets to the legitimate owners, in this case the people of the Republic of Korea.”

“This most recent seizure is part of an ongoing effort by HSI to identify and seize illegal assets in the United States obtained by corrupt foreign leaders who use our country as a safe haven to conceal the illicit proceeds of their crimes,” said HSI Assistant Director Connolly. “HSI special agents in our 67 offices in 48 countries will continue to work with our domestic offices as well as international law enforcement partners to hold these individuals accountable by denying them the enjoyment of their ill-gotten gains.”

As alleged in the forfeiture complaint, President Chun was convicted in Korea in 1997 of receiving more than $200 million in bribes from Korean businesses and companies. President Chun and his relatives laundered some of these corruption proceeds through a web of nominees and shell companies in both Korea and the United States.

Through close cooperation between U.S. and Korean law enforcement and prosecution authorities, the $721,951 sought for forfeiture was identified and seized when President Chun’s relatives sold a home in Newport Beach that previously had been purchased with the laundered proceeds of President Chun’s corruption.

This case was brought under the Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative by a team of dedicated prosecutors in the Criminal Division’s Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section, working in partnership with federal law enforcement agencies to forfeit the proceeds of foreign official corruption and, where appropriate, return those proceeds to benefit the people harmed by these acts of corruption and abuse of office. Individuals with information about possible proceeds of foreign corruption located in or laundered through the United States should contact federal law enforcement or send an email to kleptocracy@usdoj.gov .

The investigation was conducted jointly by the FBI’s Kleptocracy Program of the International Corruption Unit within the Criminal Investigation Division and the West Covina Resident Agency of the Los Angeles Division and HSI Attaché Seoul, with assistance from HSI Miami. The case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorney Woo S. Lee of the Criminal Division’s Asset Forfeiture and Money Laundering Section, with substantial support from the Criminal Division’s Office of International Affairs.

The owner of a Louisiana pharmacy pleaded guilty today for directing a $2.2 million Medicare fraud scheme to repackage and redistribute prescription medications.

Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, Interim U.S. Attorney J. Walter Green of the Middle District of Louisiana, Special Agent in Charge Mike Fields of the Dallas Region of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of the Inspector General (HHS-OIG), Special Agent in Charge Michael Anderson of the FBI’s New Orleans Division and Louisiana State Attorney General James Buddy Caldwell made the announcement.

Mona Patrice Carter, 47, pleaded guilty before U.S. District Judge James J. Brady of the Middle District of Louisiana to one count of health care fraud. Sentencing will be determined at a later date.

Carter admitted that she owned and operated Community Pharmacy 1, a Baton Rouge pharmacy. From 2007 through December 2013, Carter paid employees of Community Pharmacy clients, including nursing homes and mental health facilities, to collect and return unused prescription drugs. When these drugs were returned to Community Pharmacy, Carter directed her employees to re-package them. Community Pharmacy then re-distributed these drugs as if they were new and billed Medicare as if they were being distributed for the first time – effectively billing Medicare twice for the same medications.

Carter admitted that from January 2008 through February 2013, she caused $2,245,515 in fraudulent billings to Medicare for prescription medications.

The case was investigated by HHS-OIG, the FBI, and the Medicaid Fraud Control Unit of the Louisiana State Attorney General’s Office and was brought as part of the Medicare Fraud Strike Force, under the supervision of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section. This case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorney William G. Kanellis of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section.

Since its inception in March 2007, the Medicare Fraud Strike Force, now operating in nine cities across the country, has charged more than 1,700 defendants who have collectively billed the Medicare program for more than $5.5 billion. In addition, HHS’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, working in conjunction with HHS-OIG, are taking steps to increase accountability and decrease the presence of fraudulent providers.

To learn more about the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT), go to: www.stopmedicarefraud.gov .

A federal grand jury returned a two-count indictment against John W. Ng, 58, of Albuquerque, New Mexico, charging him with hate crime offenses related to anti-Semitic threats he made against a Jewish woman who owns and operates the Nosh Jewish Delicatessen and Bakery in Albuquerque.  

Ng was arrested by the FBI on March 7, 2014, based on a criminal complaint alleging that he interfered with the victim’s federally protected rights by threatening the victim and interfering with her business because of her religion and because she owned a Jewish restaurant.  According to the indictment, on Jan. 22, 2014, and Feb. 8, 2014, Ng allegedly posted threatening, anti-Semitic notes on the door of the victim’s business.  One of the notes allegedly read, “TO: The [racial slur] who should die.”  Another allegedly read, “FROM:  The one you scarred for life scumbags [;] TO: The [racial slur] who will die like rats.”  

Ng was arrested by the FBI on March 7, 2014.  He remains in federal custody pending completion of a psychiatric competency and dangerousness examination.  

An indictment merely establishes probable cause, and Ng is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.  Each count carries a maximum statutory penalty of one year in prison.

This matter was investigated by the Albuquerque Division of the FBI and is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney Holland S. Kastrin of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of New Mexico and Trial Attorney Angie Cha of the U.S. Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division.

A Maryland man was sentenced today to serve one year and a day in prison for defrauding thousands of homeowners in a $4 million nationwide home loan modification scheme.

Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Carmen M. Ortiz of the District of Massachusetts and Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (SIGTARP) Christy Romero made the announcement.

Brian Kelly, 37, of Forest Hill, was sentenced by U.S. District Court Judge Rya W. Zobel of the District of Massachusetts and ordered to serve three years of supervised release following his prison term. Restitution will be determined at a later date.

Kelly pleaded guilty on May 2, 2013, to one count of conspiracy, nine counts of mail fraud and nine counts of wire fraud.

According to court records, Kelly and others, operating under the name Home Owners Protection Economics Inc. (HOPE), made a series of misrepresentations to induce struggling homeowners to pay HOPE $400 to $2,000 in up-front fees in exchange for HOPE’s help obtaining federally funded home loan modifications. Kelly was one of HOPE’s more successful salespeople, receiving approximately $24,000 after arranging fraudulent home loan modifications totaling approximately $180,000.

Also according to court documents, the conspirators misrepresented that, with HOPE’s assistance, the homeowner was guaranteed to receive a loan modification under the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP), which is part of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) and is a federally funded mortgage-assistance program. For example, the defendants routinely claimed that the homeowner had already been approved for a loan modification, provided phony “approval codes,” quoted new (and wholly fictitious) mortgage terms and due dates, touted their 98 percent past success rate and claimed that they were “underwriters” or were otherwise affiliated with the homeowners’ mortgage companies. HOPE also claimed that it would offer homeowners refunds in the unlikely event that they did not receive a loan modification.

According to court documents, in exchange for the up-front fees, HOPE sent its customers, including homeowners in Massachusetts, a do-it-yourself application package, which was virtually identical to the application that the government provides free of charge. The HOPE customers had no advantage in the application process, and, in fact, most of their applications were denied. Through these misrepresentations, HOPE was able to persuade thousands of homeowners to pay more than $4 million in fees.

Two co-defendants, Christopher S. Godfrey, 44, of Delray Beach, Fla., and Dennis Fischer, 42, of Highland Beach, Fla., were convicted after trial and were each sentenced on Feb. 20, 2014, to serve 84 months in prison. A third co-defendant, Vernell Burris, Jr., 54, of Coconut Creek, Fla, pleaded guilty and was sentenced on Feb. 25, 2014, to serve a year and a day in prison.

The case was investigated by SIGTARP and is being prosecuted by Senior Trial Attorney Mona Sedky of the Criminal Division’s Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Adam Bookbinder in the District of Massachusetts’s Computer Crimes Unit.

The Department of Justice and Bazaarvoice Inc. have agreed on a remedy that will address Bazaarvoice’s illegal acquisition of PowerReviews Inc. by requiring Bazaarvoice to divest the assets it acquired from PowerReviews and adhere to other requirements to fully restore competition in the provision of online product ratings and reviews platforms.

 
On Jan. 8, 2014, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco ruled that Bazaarvoice violated Section 7 of the Clayton Act when it acquired PowerReviews, its only serious competitor.  Today’s proposed remedy, if approved by the court, will resolve the department’s competitive concerns associated with Bazaarvoice’s acquisition of PowerReviews.

 
“As a result of today’s agreement, Bazaarvoice will remedy the harm caused by its unlawful acquisition of PowerReviews,” said Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer in charge of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division.  “In addition, Bazaarvoice has agreed to meaningful additional measures that will allow a divestiture buyer to quickly achieve the competitive position that PowerReviews would have occupied today, absent the unlawful transaction.”

 
The proposed remedy requires Bazaarvoice to sell all of the PowerReviews assets to a divestiture buyer and contains other provisions to compensate for the deterioration of PowerReviews’ competitive position that occurred as a result of the transaction.  Under the terms of the agreement, Bazaarvoice is required to provide syndication services to the divestiture buyer for four years, allowing the divestiture buyer to build its customer base and develop its own syndication network.  Bazaarvoice is required to waive breach of contract claims against its customers, allowing them to switch to the divestiture buyer without penalty.  Bazaarvoice is also required to waive trade-secret restrictions for any of its employees who are hired by the divestiture buyer, enabling the buyer to leverage Bazaarvoice’s post-merger research and development efforts.  

 
Additionally, the agreement provides for the appointment of a trustee to oversee the divestiture process and to monitor Bazaarvoice’s compliance with its other obligations under the proposed remedy. 

 
Bazaarvoice’s acquisition of PowerReviews was not required to be reported under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Antitrust Improvements Act of 1976, which requires companies to notify and provide information to the department and the Federal Trade Commission before consummating certain acquisitions.  The department began its investigation shortly after the transaction closed.

 
On Jan. 10, 2013, the department filed a civil antitrust lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California in San Francisco against Bazaarvoice.  The department alleged that Bazaarvoice’s June 2012 acquisition of PowerReviews eliminated the company’s only significant rival, in violation of the antitrust laws. 

 
The department’s trial against Bazaarvoice, conducted by Judge William H. Orrick III, began on Sept. 23, 2013.  The trial lasted three weeks, with closing arguments taking place on Oct. 15, 2013.  On Jan. 8, 2014, the court found that Bazaarvoice violated Section 7 of the Clayton Act by acquiring its primary rival, PowerReviews.

The proposed remedy, along with the department’s competitive impact statement, will be published in the Federal Register, consistent with the requirements of the Antitrust Procedures and Penalties Act.  Any person may submit written comments concerning the proposed remedy within 60-days of its publication to James J. Tierney, Chief, Networks & Technology Enforcement Section, Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice, 450 Fifth Street, N.W., 7th Floor, Washington, D.C. 20530.  These comments will be published either in the Federal Register or, with the permission of the court, will be posted electronically on the department’s website.  At the conclusion of the 60-day comment period, the court may enter the final judgment upon a finding that it serves the public interest.

The Justice Department reached an agreement today with Mexico Foods LLC, aka El Rancho Corp., a supermarket chain based in Garland, Texas, resolving claims that the company engaged in discrimination during the employment eligibility verification process in violation of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).

The department’s investigation was initiated based on a referral from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.  The investigation revealed that El Rancho required lawful permanent residents to present a new employment eligibility document after being hired when their Permanent Resident cards expired, even though the Form I-9 and E-Verify rules prohibit this practice because lawful permanent residents have permanent work authorization in the United States, even after their Permanent Resident cards expire.  The investigation also uncovered evidence that El Rancho routinely requested a specific work authority document from lawful permanent residents during the initial employment eligibility verification process even though under the law employees are allowed to choose what documents to present.  The department found that El Rancho’s discriminatory practices were based on employees’ citizenship status.       

Under the settlement agreement, El Rancho must pay $43,000 in civil penalties, undergo training on the antidiscrimination provision of the INA and submit to monitoring for a period of 18 months, during which the department may review the company’s employment eligibility verification practices. 

“The Justice Department is committed to ensuring that work-authorized immigrants do not face discrimination in employment,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels for the Civil Rights Division.  “We applaud El Rancho for cooperating with the department and taking immediate action to correct its employment eligibility verification practices.”

The Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices (OSC) is responsible for enforcing the anti-discrimination provision of the INA.  The statute prohibits, among other things, citizenship status and national origin discrimination in hiring, firing or recruitment or referral for a fee, document abuse and retaliation or intimidation .  This matter was handled by OSC Trial Attorney Richard Crespo and OSC Equal Opportunity Specialist Joann Sazama.  For more information about protections against employment discrimination under immigration laws or how to sign up for a free webinar, call OSC’s worker hotline at 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired), call OSC’s employer hotline at 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired) or visit the OSC website at www.justice.gov/crt/about/osc .  

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

The Department of Justice today announced that Joseph F. Klimavicz will become its new chief information officer (CIO), arriving in late May. Klimavicz will provide leadership and oversight of the department’s information technology programs and services in support of the department’s technology-intensive law enforcement mission.

Klimavicz will replace Luke McCormack, who left the department in November 2013. Kevin Deeley, deputy CIO, has served as acting CIO since McCormack’s departure. Deeley will continue to serve as deputy CIO.

“Joe has the leadership and technical skills needed to oversee the Justice Department’s information management and technology programs,” said Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole. “Joe is well positioned to lead the department’s efforts to continue to enhance our cyber security protections and our law enforcement sharing programs. As acting CIO, Kevin has ensured that the department’s overall information technology efforts have remained on track and that our cyber security programs have remained strong. I want to thank him for his leadership during this time of transition.”

The Office of the CIO provides strategic direction, management services and oversight to cross-component information technology efforts, and provides IT infrastructure services such as telecommunications, desktop and data center services and IT security.

Prior to joining the department, Klimavicz was the CIO of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) at the Department of Commerce since January 2007. In that capacity, he was responsible for all aspects of the acquisition, management and use of NOAA’s information technology resources, to include NOAA’s high performance computing and communications infrastructure. During his tenure at NOAA, he strengthened the agency’s cyber security posture, consolidated and expanded high performance computing and modernized a variety of business systems.

Klimavicz served as deputy CIO for the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency from December 2003 to January 2007. While there, he managed the design, implementation and operation of the information technology infrastructure. Klimavicz has served in various roles in the Department of Defense, including director of the Enterprise Services Office and Chief, Infrastructure Operations and Support Division for the National Imagery and Mapping Agency.

He received a U.S. Presidential Rank Award for Distinguished Executive Service for his outstanding efforts in information technology in 2012. Klimavicz received Bachelor of Science and Master of Engineering degrees from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in 1983 and 1988, respectively.

A former executive of a rubber hose manufacturer, who was extradited from Germany in early April 2014, today pleaded guilty and was sentenced to serve two years in prison for participating in a conspiracy to rig bids, fix prices and allocate market shares of marine hose sold in the United States and elsewhere, the Department of Justice announced. 

Romano Pisciotti, an Italian national and a former manager of Parker ITR Srl’s Oil & Gas Business Unit, pleaded guilty in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida in Ft. Lauderdale, to a one-count felony indictment that was filed under seal on Aug. 26, 2010, and unsealed on Aug. 5, 2013.

Pisciotti was extradited from Germany on April 3, 2014, in the first successfully litigated extradition on an antitrust charge.  Pisciotti was arrested in Germany on June 17, 2013, and made his initial appearance in U.S. District court on April 4, 2014.  Pisciotti will serve a total of two years in prison with credit for the nine months and 16 days he was held in the custody of the German government pending his extradition.  He has also agreed to pay a $50,000 criminal fine. 

“Today’s guilty plea demonstrates the Antitrust Division’s ability to bring to justice those who violate antitrust laws, even when they attempt to avoid prosecution by remaining in foreign jurisdictions,” said Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer in charge of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division.  “The Antitrust Division and its law enforcement partners will continue to protect consumers from cartels that affect the domestic and international economy.”

 
Marine hose is a flexible rubber hose used to transfer oil between tankers and storage facilities.  During the conspiracy, the cartel affected prices for hundreds of millions of dollars in sales of marine hose and related products sold worldwide.

According to the indictment, Pisciotti carried out the conspiracy by agreeing during meetings, conversations and communications to allocate shares of the marine hose market among the conspirators; use a price list for marine hose in order to implement the conspiracy; and not compete for customers with other marine hose sellers either by not submitting prices or bids or by submitting intentionally high prices or bids, all in accordance with the agreements reached among the conspiring companies.  As part of the conspiracy, Pisciotti and his conspirators provided information received from customers in the United States and elsewhere about upcoming marine hose jobs to another co-conspirator who served as a coordinator of the conspiracy.  The coordinator acted as a clearinghouse for bidding information that was shared among the conspirators, and was paid by the manufacturers for coordinating the conspiracy.  Pisciotti recruited at least two individuals from other marine hose firms to participate in the conspiracy.  The department said the conspiracy began at least as early as 1999 and continued until at least May 2007.  Pisciotti was charged with participating in the conspiracy from at least as early as 1999 until at least November 2006.

           
As a result of the department’s ongoing marine hose investigation, five companies – Parker ITR; Bridgestone Corp. of Japan; Manuli SPa of Italy’s Florida subsidiary; Trelleborg of France; and Dunlop Marine and Oil Ltd., of the United Kingdom – and eight other individuals have pleaded guilty and have been sentenced to serve prison terms ranging from 12 months and one day to 30 months.  An additional individual was sentenced to serve six months home confinement.  Indicted fugitive Uwe Bangert, a German national formerly associated with Dunlop Marine and Oil Ltd., remains at large.

The investigation is being conducted by the Antitrust Division’s Washington Criminal I Section, the Defense Criminal Investigative Service (DCIS) of the Department of Defense’s Office of Inspector General, the U.S. Navy Criminal Investigative Service and the FBI.  The U.S. Marshals Service and other law enforcement agencies from multiple foreign jurisdictions are also investigating or assisting in the ongoing matter. The Criminal Division’s Office of International Affairs and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida provided assistance.

Anyone with information concerning bid rigging or other anticompetitive conduct in the marine products industry is urged to call the Antitrust Division’s Washington Criminal I Section at 202-307-6694.

Velma I. Salinas-Nix and Kenneth H. Nix, of Boerne, Texas, were sentenced today to serve 20 months in prison and 30 months in prison, respectively, for filing false tax returns and making false statements to the U.S. Army by filing false financial ethics disclosure forms, the Justice Department announced.  On Jan. 22, 2014, Kenneth Nix pleaded guilty to one count of filing a false federal income tax return.  The next day, Velma Salinas-Nix pleaded guilty to one count of filing a false tax return and one count of making false statements.  The Nixes were each ordered to pay $153,248 in restitution.

According to court documents, Velma Salinas-Nix was a senior civilian official of the U.S. Department of the Army.  During the relevant period, she was the Deputy Director and Alternate Principal Assistant Responsible for Contracting (Deputy PARC) for ACA - Americas (also known as the 410th Contracting Support Brigade) in San Antonio with influence over and responsibility for the disbursement of millions of dollars in Army funds for the procurement of goods and services.  Previously, she was the Chief of Contracting for the Chicago District for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.  During parts of 2004 and 2005, Kenneth Nix also worked for the Army as the Chief of Contracting for the U.S. Military Group in Bogota, Colombia, and during parts of 2008 and 2009, as Chief of Staff of the Mission and Installation Contracting Command in San Antonio. 

According to court documents, from 2000 through at least 2009, Kenneth Nix had a working relationship with Person A, the president and CEO of Company A, a federal contractor.  During this period, Kenneth Nix received at least $500,000 in gross income for federal contracting related work he performed.  Kenneth Nix directed that he be kept off Company A’s books and he received payment in multiple forms, including cash, blank money orders, checks, home improvements of the couple’s residences, paid housing and parking, plumbing supplies and use of a debit card.  Most of the income was deposited into joint bank accounts the Nixes controlled.  In at least two instances, Velma Salinas-Nix deposited blank money orders that her husband received from Company A for $25,000 each into her bank account.  In order to conceal the true source of the money orders, she falsely wrote the name and initials of her mother in the remitter field. 

According to court documents, the Nixes also received gifts of substantial value from Person A between 2000 and 2009, knowing that Person A and Company A had received and were seeking Army contracts and that Kenneth Nix worked for Company A.  These gifts included, among other things, a Rolex watch, a pearl bracelet, a trip for the Nixes to Panama with Person A, custom architectural drawings and a $5,000 Home Depot gift card.  In October 2009, Velma Salinas-Nix participated in a voluntary interview with federal agents, during which she knowingly provided false information by denying her husband’s receipt of income from Company A, the existence of large money orders provided by Company A and her receipt of gifts from Person A during the relevant period.

According to court documents, from 2004 through 2009, Velma Salinas-Nix also willfully signed and submitted materially false financial ethics disclosure forms, known as Office of Government Ethics Forms 450 (OGE-450 Form), to the Army.  She knowingly omitted all of the income and gifts from Company A and Person A on these forms.  In 2004 and 2009, Kenneth Nix willfully signed and submitted materially false OGE-450 Forms to the Army on which he knowingly omitted all income from Company A.  Both Nixes provided non-public Army contracting information to Company A and awarded Company A with contracts from their Army positions.  For tax years 2000 through 2004, and 2006 through 2008, the Nixes willfully filed false joint federal income tax returns omitting all income Kenneth Nix received from Company A.

The case was investigated by the Department of the Army-Criminal Investigation Division, IRS-Criminal Investigation, the FBI and the Defense Criminal Investigative Service.  Trial Attorney Rebecca Perlmutter for the Tax Division and Trial Attorneys Mary Strimel and Richard A. Hellings for the Antitrust Division are prosecuting the case.

WASHINGTON – El Departamento de Justicia llegó a un acuerdo hoy con Mexico Foods, LLC, alias El Rancho Corp., una cadena de supermercados con sede en Garland, Texas, por medio de cual se resuelven acusaciones de que la compañía incurrió en discriminación durante el proceso de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo en violación de La Ley de Inmigración y Nacionalidad (INA por sus siglas en inglés).

La investigación del departamento fue iniciada basado en una remisión del Servicio de Ciudadanía e Inmigración de los Estados Unidos (USCIS por su siglas en inglés). La investigación reveló que El Rancho requería que los residentes permanentes legales presentaran un nuevo documento de elegibilidad de empleo después de haber sido contratados cuando se les vencían sus Tarjetas de Residentes Permanentes, aunque esta práctica está prohibida conforme con las reglas del Formulario I-9 y de E-Verify porque los residentes permanentes legales cuentan con autorización de trabajo permanente en los Estados Unidos, aun cuando se les vencen sus tarjetas de residencia. La investigación también descubrió evidencia que El Rancho rutinariamente les solicitaba un documento específico de autorización de trabajo a los residentes permanentes legales durante el proceso inicial de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo, a pesar de que bajo la ley empleados tienen el derecho de escoger cual documento van presentar. El departamento encontró que las prácticas discriminatorias de El Rancho se basaban en el estatus de ciudadanía de los empleados.

Según este acuerdo, El Rancho debe pagar $43,000 en sanciones civiles, participar en adiestramiento sobre la provisión antidiscriminatoria del INA, y estar sujeto a un período de monitoreo de 18 meses, durante el cuál el departamento pudiera revisar las prácticas de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo de la compañía.

"El Departamento de Justicia está comprometido en garantizar que los inmigrantes que tienen autorización de trabajo no enfrenten barreras discriminatorias en el empleo," dijo Sub-Procuradora General Interina, Jocelyn Samuels, para la Divsión de Derechos Civiles. "Aplaudimos a El Rancho por su cooperación con el departamento y por tomar acción inmediata para corregir sus prácticas de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo."

La Oficina del Consejero Especial para Prácticas Injustas Relacionadas es responsable de exigir el cumplimiento con la provisión anti-discriminación de la INA. La ley prohíbe, entre otras cosas, discriminación a base del estatus the cuidadania u origen nacional durante la contratación, despido, o el reclutamiento o la referencia por comisión, abuso de documentos, y represalias. Este asunto fue manejado por Abogado de OSC Richard Crespo e Investigadora de OSC Joann Sazama. Para más información sobre las protecciones contra discriminación en el empleo bajo las leyes de inmigración o como registrarse para un seminario virtual gratis, llame a la línea directa de OSC para trabajadores al 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY para personas con discapacidad auditiva), llame a la línea directa de OSC para empleadores al 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY para personas con discapacidad auditiva), o visite el sitio de internet a www.justice.gov/crt/about/osc.

Los solicitantes o empleados que consideren que fueron sujetos a diferentes requisitos de verificación a base de su estatus de ciudadanía, estatus migratorio, u origen nacional, o discriminación por estatus de ciudadanía, estatus migratorio, u origen nacional con relación a la contratación, el despido y el reclutamiento o la referencia por comisión, deberán comunicarse a la línea dedicada a los trabajadores anteriormente citada para poderlos ayudar.

Arturo Gallegos Castrellon, aka “Benny,” “Farmero,” “51,” “Guero,” “Pecas,” “Tury,” and “86,” 35, of Chihuahua, Mexico, the Barrio Azteca Lieutenant who ordered the March 2010 murders of a U.S. Consulate employee, her husband and the husband of another U.S. Consulate employee, was sentenced today to serve life in prison.

Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Robert Pitman for the Western District of Texas, Special Agent in Charge Douglas E. Lindquist of the FBI’s El Paso Division and Administrator Michele M. Leonhart of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) made the announcement.

“ Arturo Gallegos Castrellon led the teams of assassins who carried out the U.S. Consulate shootings in March 2010 and ruthlessly murdered nearly 1,600 others as part of a cartel conflict over a drug trafficking route from Mexico into the United States,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General O’Neil. “His gang of killers terrorized and victimized men and women on both sides of the border, but thanks to the hard work of our law enforcement partners he will now spend the rest of his life in prison for his crimes.”

“I cannot overstate the significance of this victory in our ongoing efforts to end the depredations of the cartels operating along our Southern border,” said U.S. Attorney Pitman.  “This prosecution has called to account Arturo Gallegos Castrellon for the senseless murders he orchestrated in Ciudad Juarez and elsewhere and demonstrates our commitment to ending the murder and mayhem he and the cartels have fomented.”

“The DEA is committed to ensuring cold-blooded criminals, like Arturo Gallegos Castrellon, who murder innocent victims, traffic huge amounts of drugs worldwide, and incite violence are taken off the street and remain behind bars,” said DEA Administrator Michele M. Leonhart.  “Castrellon’s conviction and life sentence is a clear sign that the DEA, along with our law enforcement partners, will not tolerate those who attack Americans abroad and is committed to upholding the rule of law, protecting our citizens, and bringing to justice the world’s worst criminals.”

Today’s sentence was imposed by U.S. District Judge Kathleen Cardone in the Western District of Texas. In addition, Judge Cardone ordered Gallegos Castrellon to pay $998,840 in restitution and $785,500 in forfeiture.

After his extradition from Mexico on June 28, 2012, a federal jury found Gallegos Castrellon guilty of six counts of murder and conspiracies to commit racketeering, narcotics trafficking, narcotics importation, murder in a foreign country and money laundering.

Evidence at trial proved that Gallegos Castrellon was a leader in the Barrio Azteca (BA), a violent street and prison gang that began in the late 1980s and expanded into a transnational criminal organization. The BA formed an alliance with “La Linea,” part of the Juarez Drug Cartel, which is also known as the Vincente Carrillo Fuentes Drug Cartel (VCF). The purpose of the BA-La Linea alliance was to battle the Sinaloa Cartel and its allies for control of the drug trafficking route through Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico. The drug route through Juarez, known as the Juarez Plaza, is important to drug trafficking organizations because it is a principal illicit drug trafficking route into the United States.

Evidence at trial also proved that Gallegos Castrellon was in charge of BA teams of assassins, which he helped create and supervised in 2008 through 2010. His teams killed up to 800 persons between January and August 2010, reaching a total of nearly 1,600 in a multi-year period.

Trial evidence also proved that Gallegos Castrellon ordered the March 13, 2010, triple homicide in Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico, of U.S. Consulate employee Leslie Enriquez, her husband Arthur Redelfs, and Jorge Salcido Ceniceros, the husband of another U.S. Consulate employee.

A total of 35 defendants were charged in the third superseding indictment and are alleged to have committed various criminal acts, including the 2010 Juarez Consulate murders, as well as racketeering, narcotics distribution and importation, retaliation against persons providing information to U.S. law enforcement, extortion, money laundering, murder and obstruction of justice.  Of the 35 defendants charged, 26 have been convicted, one committed suicide before the conclusion of his trial, and two remain fugitives, including Eduardo Ravelo, an FBI Top Ten Most Wanted Fugitive.

The case was investigated by the FBI’s El Paso Field Office, Albuquerque Field Office (Las Cruces Resident Agency), DEA Juarez, and DEA El Paso. Special assistance was provided by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives; Immigration and Customs Enforcement; the U.S. Marshals Service; U.S. Customs and Border Protection; the Federal Bureau of Prisons; the U.S. Diplomatic Security Service; the Texas Department of Public Safety; the Texas Department of Criminal Justice; the El Paso Police Department; the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office; the El Paso Independent School District Police Department; the Texas Alcohol and Beverage Commission; the New Mexico State Police; the Dona Ana County, N.M., Sheriff’s Office; the Las Cruces, N.M., Police Department; the Southern New Mexico Correctional Facility and the Otero County Prison Facility New Mexico.

The case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorney Joseph A. Cooley of the Criminal Division’s Organized Crime and Gang Section, Trial Attorney Brian Skaret of the Criminal Division’s Human Rights and Special Prosecutions Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney John Gibson of the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Western District of Texas - El Paso Division. Valuable assistance was provided by the Criminal Division’s Offices of International Affairs and Enforcement Operations.

Ivory Bolen, of Dothan, Alabama, was sentenced to serve 42 months in prison today to be followed by three years of supervised release for committing stolen identity refund fraud (SIRF) crimes, announced Assistant Attorney General Kathryn Keneally of the Justice Department’s Tax Division and U.S. Attorney George L. Beck Jr. for the Middle District of Alabama.  Bolen previously pleaded guilty to wire fraud and aggravated identity theft. 

According to the plea agreement, between January 2012 and June 2013, Bolen was involved in SIRF crimes, the use of stolen identities to steal money from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) by filing fraudulent tax returns claiming refunds in the victims’ names.  She admitted that she obtained stolen identities from various sources, including the Social Security Death Index and jail records, and to filing fraudulent tax returns using those stolen identities from public WiFi hotspots in the Dothan area.  Bolen had the fraudulently obtained refunds deposited onto prepaid debit cards and recruited individuals from a homeless shelter to cash out the cards for her in an effort to avoid surveillance.  In her plea agreement, Bolen also admitted to possessing hundreds of stolen identities in Tampa, Florida.  Altogether, the false tax returns filed by Bolen fraudulently claimed more than $800,000 in refunds.  Many of the returns were detected as fraudulent by the IRS and stopped.  However, Bolen successfully defrauded the IRS into paying over $200,000 in illegitimate refunds, and was ordered to pay $209,243 in restitution to the IRS.   

This case was investigated by special agents of the IRS-Criminal Investigation and by the Tampa Police Department.  Trial Attorneys Jason Poole and Charles Edgar of the Tax Division are prosecuting the case with the assistance of Assistant U.S. Attorney Todd Brown and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Alabama. 

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

SACRAMENTO, California. — Los resultados de una operación de un año de duración con la intervención de múltiples agencias policiales y cuerpos de seguridad dirigida contra los cultivadores y distribuidores de marihuana en los Condados de Shasta y Trinidad fueron anunciados hoy por el procurador federal Benjamin B. Wagner, el alguacil del Condado de Shasta Tom Bosenko, y el alguacil del Condado de Trinidad Bruce Haney.

La operación, denominada “Operación Condados Seguros,” està específicamente dirigida contra individuos y grupos en los Condados de Shasta y Trinidad involucrados en el cultivo de marihuana en terrenos públicos, así como aquellos que cultivan marihuana en propiedad privada y distribuyen su producto por toda California y los Estados Unidos utilizando mensajeros, el Servicio Postal de los Estados Unidos, e incluso aviones privados. Como resultado de estas investigaciones, 16 demandados han sido acusados por la  Procuradería Federal para el Distrito Oriental de California por el delito federal grave por drogas, y 10 màs han sido acusados por el Fiscal Condado de Shasta por delitos relacionados con drogas y el medio ambiente. En el curso de la operación y hasta la fecha, casi 60,000 plantas de marihuana, màs de 2,100 libras de marihuana procesada, 70 armas de fuego y màs de un millón de dólares de los Estados Unidos han sido confiscados. Varias investigaciones que comenzaron como resultado de la Operación Condados Seguros estàn aún en marcha.

Wagner, el procurador federal para el Distrito Oriental de California, dijo: “El uso de terrenos públicos en los Condados de Shasta y Trinidad para el cultivo comercial de marihuana presenta una amenaza para las personas que son dueñas o que utilizan esas tierras y para la tierra misma. El uso de terrenos privados para producir marihuana para su venta en otros estados, a menudo involucrando armas de fuego y violencia potencial, viola la ley federal y crea condiciones peligrosas aquí en el norte de California. Junto con nuestros socios de agencias policiales estatales y locales, estamos comprometidos a combatir estos delitos.”

El alguacil del Condado de Shasta Tom Bosenko declaró: “El centro de los esfuerzos de las agencias policiales son las operaciones criminales contra la marihuana. En años recientes la producción ilegal de marihuana se ha expandido significativamente. Las operaciones ilegales del cultivo de marihuana continúan siendo una amenaza inminente para nuestro medio ambiente, nuestra comunidad, y nuestros ciudadanos. Un esfuerzo colaborador entre agencias federales, estatales y locales es una fuerza multiplicadora no solamente contra estas operaciones sino contra el daño ambiental en terrenos públicos y privados.”

El alguacil del Condado de Trinidad Bruce Haney declaró: “Me gustaría dar las gracias al procurador federal Ben Wagner, y a las agencias policiales federales, locales y estatales que ayudaron a la Oficina del Alguacil de Trinidad con la Operación Condados Seguros el pasado agosto. Al igual que muchas comunidades, el Condado de Trinidad se ha visto abrumado por cultivos comerciales de marihuana que se escudan detràs del Compassionate Use Act (Ley de Uso Compasivo), Prop 215. Aunque hay usuarios legítimos que usan marihuana como medicina, las agencias policiales, los miembros de la comunidad y los cultivadores mismos saben que la mayoría de la marihuana que se cultiva en nuestros condados se transporta y se vende por todos los Estados Unidos. Esto es una violación de la ley estatal y federal. Esta actividad ilegal crea un ambiente peligroso para nuestros hijos y otros miembros de nuestras comunidades. El daño ambiental de la producción comercial de marihuana es también una inquietud muy real y està comenzando a ser el centro de muchas investigaciones. Hasta que la sociedad decida qué hacer con la marihuana, continuaremos trabajando de cerca con nuestros socios estatales y federales para proporcionar un lugar seguro para vivir, trabajar y visitar.”

Un caso que implica el cultivo exterior en terrenos públicos comenzó el 5 de junio de 2013, cuando agentes de policía llevaron a cabo una incursión en un jardín de marihuana en el Bosque Nacional Shasta Trinity. Se erradicaron aproximadamente 28,847 plantas de marihuana. La marihuana era regada con agua desviada del cercano arroyo de Big Bar Creek. Se encontró a Salvador Alcàzar-Varelas, de 28 años de edad, de Santa Rosa, California, trabajando en el lugar y fue acusado de conspiración para producir marihuana y producción de marihuana. Se declaró culpable de los cargos el 10 de abril de 2014 y està programado para recibir sentencia el 10 de julio de 2014.

Un caso que implica propiedad privada comenzó en el 2013, cuando la atención de la policía se dirigió a una propiedad rural en Palo Cedro después de que muchos vecinos se quejaron del fuerte olor a marihuana y actividad inusual en y alrededor de la mencionada propiedad. Un sobrevuelo confirmó el cultivo activo de marihuana en curso. Una búsqueda posterior reveló 531 plantas de marihuana creciendo en este lugar. Un registro de la residencia de John Richard Leithmann reveló 73 plantas de marihuana creciendo adentro. Otros dos individuos, Eric Cop y Mark Cop estaban en la propiedad de Palo Cedro en el momento de la inspección, y ambos admitieron cultivar marihuana en ese lugar. Un cultivo interior de marihuana consistente de 108 plantas de marihuana fue descubierto en la residencia de Mark Cop. Los tres son acusados de conspiración para producir marihuana y de producción de marihuana. Estàn programados para una audiencia preliminar el 16 de mayo de 2014.

Se llevaron a cabo casi tres docenas de investigaciones separadas bajo la agrupación de “Operación Condados Seguros,” por varias agencias policiales federales, estatales y locales. Los casos federales estàn siendo procesados por los ayudantes del procurador federal Michael McCoy y Christiaan H. Highsmith.

Las acusaciones son solamente alegaciones, y a los demandados que han sido acusados en estos casos se les considera inocentes a menos que y hasta que se les declare culpables.

Under an agreement announced today by the U.S Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Justice, the Virgin Islands Water and Power Authority (VIWAPA) will come into compliance with air pollution control requirements in the federal Clean Air Act at its Estate Richmond Generating Facility located on St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands.  These air pollution control requirements help reduce emissions of nitrogen oxides (NOx) and particulate matter (PM) that can cause serious respiratory health effects. These pollutants are linked to serious health problems, including asthma, lung and heart disease. 

The United States found that the facility violated limits on nitrogen oxides and particulate matter.  This agreement is expected to reduce nitrogen oxides emissions by approximately 115 tons per year.  The agreement is expected to reduce particulate matter emissions by approximately three tons per year.

“Residents will breathe cleaner air as a result of this agreement to reduce air pollution emissions and bring VIWAPA into compliance with the nation’s Clean Air Act,” said Robert G. Dreher, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division.  “The Justice Department and our partners at EPA are committed to addressing large sources of pollution to ensure the maximum positive impact on public health and the environment.”

“This legal agreement will go a long way toward reducing air pollution in St. Croix and beyond,” said EPA Regional Administrator Judith A. Enck. “EPA is committed to protecting communities on St. Croix that are threatened by air pollution.” 

Under the EPA’s air permit requirements, large industrial facilities that make modifications that increase air pollution emissions must install best available control technology.  VIWAPA operates with a permit that requires it to use the best available control technology to control emissions of NOx and PM.  EPA found that VIWAPA had not properly operated nor maintained its water to fuel injection pollution control system during various times from October 2005 through December 2012.

The facility also failed to meet the particulate matter emissions limit during testing of emissions from its stacks and failed to conduct continuous monitoring to ensure compliance with its limits.  The EPA found that the facility violated its limits for NOx and PM.  VIWAPA also did not keep proper records.

Under the agreement, VIWAPA will continue its work to:

• Properly operate and maintain the water to fuel injection pollution control system;
• Develop and maintain an inventory of spare parts for the facility’s water to fuel injection system and emission monitoring equipment; 
• Test and properly operate a “real-time” emission monitoring system to ensure compliance with air pollution limits; 
• Conduct quality assurance testing of air monitoring systems;
• Conduct stack tests to demonstrate compliance with the Clean Air Act; and
• Employ an independent third party to develop protocols, enable proper operation of the air pollution monitoring systems, train staff and audit its compliance for three years.

The EPA has worked with VIWAPA over the past several years to address its violations and operations at the St. Croix facility.  As a result of that work, VIWAPA has already repaired and replaced pollution controls and monitoring equipment at the facility.  It replaced its data system, significantly repaired at least one unit and began purchasing better quality fuel.  To date, VIWAPA has spent approximately $4 million to come into compliance with pollution control requirements and will spend at least $2 million a year to maintain compliance.  VIWAPA will also pay a $700,000 penalty.

The consent decree was lodged in the U.S. District Court for the District of the Virgin Islands.  Notice of the lodging of the consent decree will appear in the Federal Register allowing for a 30-day public comment period before the consent decree can be entered by the court as final judgment.  The consent decree will available for viewing at www.justice.gov/enrd/Consent_Decrees.html

To learn more about air issues in EPA Region 2, please visit: www.epa.gov/region02/air/.

A criminal information has been filed against a Pennsylvania firm and its chief officer, charging them with conspiracy to evade export reporting requirements and with attempting to smuggle to Iran a lathe machine in violation of U.S. export regulations. The announcement was made today by the U.S. Attorney Peter J. Smith for the Middle District of Pennsylvania.

Charged in the Criminal Information were Hetran Inc., an engineering and manufacturing plant in Orwigsburg, Pa., and its chief executive officer, Helmut Oertmann. At the same time, an indictment was unsealed that had previously been voted by a federal grand jury in Harrisburg in December 2012 against three Iranians and two Iranian firms connected with the criminal scheme: Mujahid Ali, Khosrow Kasraei, Reza Ghoreishi, FIMCO FZE, and Crescent International Trade and Services FZE.

Also charged was Suniel Malhotra, an Indian national, an overseas sales representative for Hetran Inc.

According to U.S. Attorney Peter Smith, Hetran allegedly manufactured a horizontal lathe, also described as a bar peeling machine (peeler), valued at more than $800,000 and weighing in excess of 50,000 pounds. A horizontal lathe, or peeling machine, is used in the production of high grade steel or bright steel,” a product used, among other things, in the manufacture of automobile and aircraft parts.

On or about June 2009, Hetran was allegedly contacted by representatives of FIMCO, an Iranian company with offices in Iran and the United Arab Emirates, and Crescent International, an affiliated company based in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.FIMCO allegedly wanted to purchase the peeler.During negotiations, it became apparent that the peeler was intended for shipment to Iran.American companies are forbidden to ship “dual use” items (such as the peeler) to Iran without first obtaining a license from the U.S. Department of Commerce.Aware that it was unlikely that such a license would be granted, Hetran, Helmut Oertmann and other co-conspirators agreed to falsely state on the shipping documents that the end-user of the peeler was Crescent International in Dubai.

On June 17, 2012, Hetranallegedlycaused the peeling machine to be shipped to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, fraudulently listing Crescent International in Dubai as the end-user, knowing that the shipment was ultimately being sent to Iran in violation of federal law.

Hetran is charged with conspiring to violate the export laws of the United States, and is subject to a sentence of up to $1,000,000.Helmut Oertmann, charged with attempting to smuggle goods from the United States to Iran, faces a potential penalty of up to 10 years imprisonment, a fine of up to $250,000 and up to 5 years supervised release.The Iranian and Indian defendants are charged with conspiring to violate and with attempting to violate the export laws of the United States, each carrying potential penalties of up to 10 years imprisonment, a fine of up to $250,000 and up to 5 years supervised release for the individual defendants and a $1,000,000 fine for each corporate defendant.

The case was investigated by the Office of Export Enforcement of the U.S. Department of Commerce.The prosecution is being coordinated by Assistant U.S. Attorney Christy Fawcett and Senior Litigation Counsel Gordon Zubrod and is being overseen by the National Security Division of the U.S. Department of Justice.

Indictments and criminal informations are only allegations. All persons charged are presumed to be innocent unless and until found guilty in court.

A sentence following a finding of guilty is imposed by the Judge after consideration of the applicable federal sentencing statutes and the Federal Sentencing Guidelines.

In this case, the maximum penalty under the federal statute is 10 years imprisonment, a term of supervised release following imprisonment and a fine. Under the Federal Sentencing Guidelines, the Judge is also required to consider and weigh a number of factors, including the nature, circumstances and seriousness of the offense; the history and characteristics of the defendant; and the need to punish the defendant, protect the public and provide for the defendant’s educational, vocational and medical needs. For these reasons, the statutory maximum penalty for the offense is not an accurate indicator of the potential sentence for a specific defendant.

Showa Corp., an automotive parts manufacturer based in Saitama, Japan, has agreed to plead guilty and to pay a $19.9 million criminal fine for its role in a conspiracy to fix prices and rig bids for pinion-assist type electric powered steering assemblies 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 Southern District of Ohio in Cincinnati, Showa engaged in a conspiracy to suppress and eliminate competition in the automotive parts industry by agreeing to rig bids for, and to fix, stabilize and maintain the prices of, certain pinion-assist type electric powered steering assemblies sold to Honda Motor Co. Ltd. and certain of its subsidiaries in the United States and elsewhere.  In addition to the criminal fine, Showa has agreed to cooperate with the department’s ongoing investigation.  The plea agreement will be subject to court approval.

“Today’s guilty plea marks the 27th time a company has been held accountable for fixing prices on parts used to manufacture cars in the United States,” said Bill Baer, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division.  “The Antitrust Division and its law enforcement partners remain committed to prosecuting illegal cartels that harm U.S. consumers and businesses.”

According to the charge, Showa and its co-conspirators carried out the conspiracy through meetings, conversations and communications in which they discussed and agreed upon bids and price quotations on pinion-assist type electric powered steering assemblies to be submitted to Honda.  Showa then submitted quotations in accordance with those agreements and sold pinion-assist type electric powered steering assemblies at collusive and noncompetitive prices.  Showa and its co-conspirators monitored adherence to the agreed-upon bid-rigging and price-fixing scheme.  The conspirators kept their conduct secret by using code names and meeting at remote locations, among other things.  Showa’s involvement in the conspiracy lasted from at least as early as 2007 until as late as September 2012.

Showa manufactures and sells pinion-assist type electric powered steering assemblies.  These devices provide power to the steering gear pinion shaft from electric motors to assist the driver to more easily steer the automobile.  Pinion-assist type electric powered steering assemblies include an electronic control unit and link the steering wheel to the tires but do not include the column, intermediate shaft, steering wheel or tires.

Including Showa, 27 companies and 24 executives have pleaded guilty or agreed to plead guilty in the division’s ongoing investigation into price fixing and bid rigging in the auto parts industry and have agreed to pay a total of $2.3 billion in criminal fines.

Showa Corp. is charged with price fixing and bid rigging in violation of the Sherman Act, which carries maximum penalties of a $100 million criminal fine for corporations.  The maximum fine may be increased to twice the gain derived from the crime or twice the loss suffered by the victims of the crime, if either of those amounts is greater than the statutory maximum fine.

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.  Today’s charge was brought by the Antitrust Division’s Chicago Office and the FBI’s Cincinnati Field Office with assistance from the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Ohio.  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 1-888-647-3258, visit www.justice.gov/atr/contact/newcase.html or call the FBI’s Cincinnati Field Office at 513-421-4310.

U.S. District Judge James K. Bredar sentenced Michael Morgan, formerly an officer at Roxbury Correctional Institution (RCI) in Hagerstown, Md., to serve 30 months in prison for depriving an inmate of his civil rights.  Morgan and other RCI officers from three different shifts assaulted Kenneth Davis, an inmate, in March 2008, in retaliation for a prior incident in which Davis struck an officer. 

Morgan pleaded guilty on Jan. 10, 2013, to deprivation of rights under color of law.  According to court documents filed in connection with his guilty plea, Morgan acknowledged that after he heard officers yelling at Davis for having previously hit an officer, he kicked Davis in the groin and then watched another officer kick Davis.  Morgan also admitted that he tried to cover up his involvement in the assault by providing false testimony during an administrative hearing on June 17, 2008.

“The defendant participated in one of the series of assaults suffered by Mr. Davis, and then he lied to cover up his involvement,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels for the Civil Rights Division.  “The defendant’s actions run completely counter to the responsibilities and trust given to correctional officers.  The Justice Department will continue to vigorously prosecute those officers who, like this defendant, commit a crime under color of law.”

To date, 16 current or former officers at RCI have been convicted in connection with the series of assaults that Kenneth Davis suffered on March 8-9, 2008.  Four former officers still await sentencing by U.S. District Judge James K. Bredar.  

The case was investigated by the Frederick Resident Agency of the FBI, and prosecuted by Special Litigation Counsel Forrest Christian and Trial Attorney Sanjay Patel of the Civil Rights Division, with the assistance of Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Cunningham of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the District of Maryland.

Alan Dresner, a federally-licensed fish dealer from Brooklyn, N.Y., pleaded guilty today in federal court in Central Islip, N.Y., to federal violations stemming from his role in systematically underreporting fluke (summer flounder) that was being harvested as part of the federal Research Set-Aside (RSA) Program, the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division announced.

Alan Dresner pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud. The scheme involved his personal falsification and internet submission of at least 120 fisheries dealer reports from July 2009 to December 2011, as part of a scheme to defraud the United States of 246,376 pounds of overharvested and underreported fluke valued at $510,000.

As part of the plea deal, Dresner agreed to be subject to between $516,000 and $577,000 in combined fines and restitution. The defendant also agreed to make a $15,000 community service payment to the Cornell Cooperative Extension of Suffolk County in order to pay for the enhancement of fluke habitat through the C.C.E.’s Marine Meadows Program. The jointly proposed sentence includes relinquishment of Dresner’s federal dealer license and a ban on accessing the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) SAFIS computer system . The court will hear sentencing recommendations regarding non-agreed terms at a hearing set for Oct. 22, 2014.

“Today, Dresner has acknowledged his role in cheating a federal research program for financial gain at the expense of law abiding fishermen,” said Robert G. Dreher, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division. “He repeatedly misled the government as he schemed to take hundreds of thousands of dollars in illegally harvested fluke. This conviction shows our commitment to protecting this resource for today’s fisherman and future generations.”

“These dealers created the market for these elicit, unreported fish and their willingness to conspire with the harvesters of these fish to no report them completely undermines the system of trying to obtain the best available science to manage this fishery,” said Logan Gregory, Special Agent in Charge of the NOAA Office of Law Enforcement’s Northeast Division. “The Office of Law Enforcement will continue to investigate this issue to conclusion.  It's not only important to fisheries management, but also important to the law abiding industry members who rely on the availability of this fish to harvest and sell.”

Alan Dresner is “Fish Dealer X” as that person is identified in the related case of U.S. v. Anthony Joseph. As a federal fish dealer, Dresner had a NOAA permit to purchase fish directly from commercial fishing vessels without having to go through an intermediary. In July 2009, Dresner learned that Anthony Joseph, captain of the F/V Stirs One, was consistently overharvesting fluke through Joseph’s abuse of the RSA Program. By July 2009, Dresner was making regular purchases of illegal fluke from Joseph at the Point Lookout, N.Y., waterfront.

In order to cover his illegal fishing, Joseph would mail falsified fishing logs, known as FVTRs, to NOAA, but falsified FVTRs were just one side of the coin. This is because fish dealers are required to report their purchases to NOAA on an electronic form known as a dealer report. The dealer reports include information such as date of landing, port of landing, catch vessel, corresponding FVTR numbers, commercial grade, species, price, and weight. NOAA utilizes the data in the dealer reports to set quotas and implement other management measures designed to ensure a sustainable fisheries. The dealer reports also serve as a check on the information that is submitted in FVTRs. In other words, in order to effectuate his scheme, Anthony Joseph needed to ensure that corresponding false dealer reports were being submitted that contained the same false information as was contained on the falsified FVTRs. A mismatch would have indicated a serious error or fraud, and would have been a red flag for fisheries managers. Accordingly, during July 2009 to December 2011, the defendant schemed with Anthony Joseph to file at least 120 false dealer reports with NOAA, representing a loss of 246,376 pounds of fluke valued at $510,000. Another part of the scheme involved Dresner paying for legitimate, reported fish with a check, but utilizing cash handoffs to Joseph to purchase the illegal fluke.

The case was investigated by agents of NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service, with assistance from the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation Police. The case is being prosecuted by Christopher L. Hale of the Justice Department’s Environmental Crimes Section, Environment and Natural Resources Division.

Related Materials:

Bill of Information
Plea Agreement

As part of the Justice Department’s new clemency initiative, Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole announced six criteria the department will consider when reviewing and expediting clemency applications from federal inmates.

Under the new initiative, the department will prioritize clemency applications from inmates who meet all of the following factors:

·          They are currently serving a federal sentence in prison and, by operation of law, likely would have received a substantially lower sentence if convicted of the same offense(s) today;

·          They are non-violent, low-level offenders without significant ties to large scale criminal organizations, gangs or cartels;

·          They have served at least 10 years of their prison sentence;

·          They do not have a significant criminal history;

·          They have demonstrated good conduct in prison; and

·          They have no history of violence prior to or during their current term of imprisonment.

“For our criminal justice system to be effective, it needs to not only be fair; but it also must be perceived as being fair,” said Deputy Attorney General Cole.  “Older, stringent punishments that are out of line with sentences imposed under today’s laws erode people’s confidence in our criminal justice system, and I am confident that this initiative will go far to promote the most fundamental of American ideals – equal justice under law.”

In December 2013, President Obama commuted the sentences of eight individuals who were sentenced under an outdated regime—many of whom would have already paid their debt to society if they had been sentenced under current law.  Since that time, President Obama has said he wants to consider more applications for clemency from inmates who are similarly situated.  The Department of Justice, which assists the president in the exercise of executive clemency by reviewing petitions for clemency for federal offenses and making recommendations, is committed to carrying out this important mission and has pledged to provide the necessary resources to fulfill this goal expeditiously.

Outside of this initiative, any inmate can apply for commutation under the standard principles for which executive clemency has been granted historically.  This initiative applies to a limited category of petitioners whose clemency applications may be especially meritorious.

Deputy Attorney General Cole also announced Deborah Leff, Acting Senior Counselor for Access to Justice, as the new head of the Office of the Pardon Attorney.  Ronald Rodgers, who previously held the position, will assist Leff during a transition period and will then take on another role at the department to be announced at a later date.

“Over the past several years, Ron has performed admirably in what is a very tough job.  He has demonstrated dedication and integrity in his work on pardons and commutations,” Cole said.

Deputy Attorney General Cole added that Acting Senior Counselor Leff’s work with the department’s Access to Justice program makes her uniquely qualified to step into the pardon attorney’s role. 

“Deborah has committed her career to the very basis of this initiative - achieving equal justice under law,” said Deputy Attorney General Cole.  “As Acting Senior Counselor for Access to Justice, her fundamental mission has been to help the justice system deliver outcomes that are fair and accessible to all.”

To facilitate the thorough and rapid review of the new clemency applications this initiative will likely spur, Deputy Attorney General Cole announced that he issued a department-wide call for attorneys willing to help review new petitions.  These attorneys will help assess the petitions to determine which fall within the six stringent standards and merit further consideration.  Department lawyers will be temporarily assigned to the Pardon Attorney’s Office.

The Bureau of Prisons (BOP) will notify inmates in the coming days about this initiative and the availability of pro bono lawyers from the newly formed Clemency Project 2014.  The Clemency Project 2014, which is made up of independent, outside groups as well as federal public defenders, was organized in response to Deputy Attorney General Cole’s Jan. 30, 2014, speech at the New York State Bar Association in which he called for assistance in identifying appropriate clemency petitions under this initiative.

In addition to notifying inmates of this initiative, BOP will provide interested inmates with an electronic survey that will help both pro bono lawyers and Justice Department lawyers to screen the petitions for the Office of the Pardon Attorney to quickly identify whether inmates meet the criteria for the program.  BOP case managers will continue to provide inmates assistance with submitting the appropriate paperwork for clemency applications.

Deputy Attorney General Cole sent a letter to all of the 93 U.S. attorneys asking for their assistance in identifying meritorious candidates and notifying them that the Pardon Attorney’s Office will be soliciting their views on petitions that appear to meet the criteria after an initial screening by the lawyers in the Office of the Pardon Attorney.

The new clemency initiative is an outgrowth of Attorney General Holder’s “Smart on Crime” initiative, which is intended to strengthen the criminal justice system, promote public safety and deliver on the promise of equal justice under law. 

The Deputy Attorney General’s Office oversees the Office of the Pardon Attorney. The department assists the president in the exercise of executive clemency.  Under the Constitution, the president’s clemency power extends only to federal criminal offenses.  All requests for executive clemency for federal offenses are directed to the pardon attorney for investigation and review.  Petitions are then sent to the Deputy Attorney General for review and recommendation to the president.

Amedisys Inc. and its affiliates (Amedisys) have agreed to pay $150 million to the federal government to resolve allegations that they violated the False Claims Act by submitting false home healthcare billings to the Medicare program, the Department of Justice announced today.  Amedisys, a Louisiana-based for-profit company, is one of the nation’s largest providers of home health services and operates in 37 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.    

“It is critical that scarce Medicare home health dollars flow only to those who provide qualified services,” said Stuart F. Delery, Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division.  “This settlement demonstrates the department’s commitment to ensuring that home health providers, like other providers, comply with the rules and don’t misuse taxpayer dollars.”  

The settlement announced today resolves allegations that, between 2008 and 2010, certain Amedisys offices improperly billed Medicare for ineligible patients and services.  Amedisys allegedly billed Medicare for nursing and therapy services that were medically unnecessary or provided to patients who were not homebound, and otherwise misrepresented patients’ conditions to increase its Medicare payments.  These billing violations were the alleged result of management pressure on nurses and therapists to provide care based on the financial benefits to Amedisys, rather than the needs of patients.    

Additionally, this settlement resolves certain allegations that Amedisys maintained improper financial relationships with referring physicians.  The Anti-Kickback Statute and the Stark Statute restrict the financial relationships that home healthcare providers may have with doctors who refer patients to them.  The United States alleged that Amedisys’ financial relationship with a private oncology practice in Georgia – whereby Amedisys employees provided patient care coordination services to the oncology practice at below-market prices – violated statutory requirements.

“Combating Medicare fraud and overbilling is a priority for my office, other components of the Department of Justice, and United States Attorneys’ Offices across the country,” said Zane David Memeger, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.  “We have recovered billions of dollars in federal health care funds from schemes such as the one alleged in this case.  Those are health care dollars that should be spent on legitimate medical needs.” 

“Home health services are a large and growing part of our federal health care system,” said Sally Quillian Yates, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Georgia.  “Health care dollars must be reserved to pay for services needed by patients, not to enrich providers who are bilking the system.”

  “Amedisys made false Medicare claims, depriving the American taxpayer of millions of dollars and unlawfully enriching Amedisys,” said Joyce White Vance, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama.  “The vigorous enforcement work by assistant U.S. attorneys in my office, along with their colleagues in North Georgia, Eastern Pennsylvania, Eastern Kentucky and the Civil Division of the Justice Department, has secured the return of $150 million to the taxpayers and stands as a warning to future wrongdoers that we will aggressively pursue them.”  

“This settlement represents a significant recovery of public funds and an important victory for the taxpayers,” said Kerry B. Harvey, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Kentucky.  “Fighting health care fraud and recovering tax payer dollars that fund our vital health care programs is one of the highest priorities for our district.”  

Amedisys also agreed to be bound by the terms of a Corporate Integrity Agreement with the Department of Health and Human Services – Office of Inspector General that requires the companies to implement compliance measures designed to avoid or promptly detect conduct similar to that which gave rise to the settlement.    

“Improper financial relationships and false billing, as alleged in this case, can shortchange taxpayers and patients,” said Daniel R. Levinson, Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.  “Our compliance agreement with Amedisys contains strong monitoring and reporting provisions to help ensure that people in Federal health programs will be protected.”   

This settlement resolves seven lawsuits pending against Amedisys in federal court – six in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania and one in the Northern District of Georgia – that were filed under the qui tam, or whistleblower, provisions of the False Claims Act, which allow private citizens to bring civil actions on behalf of the United States and share in any recovery.  As part of today’s settlement, the whistleblowers – primarily former Amedisys employees – will collectively split over $26 million.  

This settlement illustrates the government’s emphasis on combating health care fraud and marks another achievement for the Health Care Fraud Prevention and Enforcement Action Team (HEAT) initiative, which was announced in May 2009 by Attorney General Eric Holder and Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius.  The partnership between the two departments has focused efforts to reduce and prevent Medicare and Medicaid financial fraud through enhanced cooperation.  One of the most powerful tools in this effort is the False Claims Act.  Since January 2009, the Justice Department has recovered a total of more than $19.2 billion through False Claims Act cases, with more than $13.6 billion of that amount recovered in cases involving fraud against federal health care programs.  

The United States’ investigation was conducted by the Justice Department’s Commercial Litigation Branch of the Civil Division; the United States Attorneys’ Offices for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, Northern District of Alabama, Northern District of Georgia, Eastern District of Kentucky, District of South Carolina, and Western District of New York; the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General; the Federal Bureau of Investigation; the Office of Personnel Management’s Office of Inspector General; the Defense Criminal Investigative Service of the Department of Defense; and the Railroad Retirement Board’s Office of Inspector General.  

The lawsuits are captioned United States ex rel. CAF Partners et al. v. Amedisys, Inc. et al. 10-cv-2323 (E.D. Pa.); United States ex rel. Brown v. Amedisys, Inc. et al., 13-cv-2803 (E.D. Pa.); United States ex rel. Umberhandt  v. Amedisys, Inc., 13-cv-2789 (E.D. Pa.); United States ex rel. Doe et al. v. Amedisys, Inc., 13-cv-3187 (E.D. Pa.); United States ex rel. Ognen et al. v. Amedisys, Inc. et al. 13-cv-4232 (E.D. Pa.); United States ex rel. Lewis v. Amedisys, Inc., 13-cv-3359 (E.D. Pa.); and United States ex rel. Natalie Raven et al. v. Amedisys, Inc. et al., 11-cv-0994 (N.D. Ga.).  The claims settled by the agreement are allegations only, and there has been no determination of liability. 

The Department of Justice announced that a federal grand jury in Florence, S.C., returned a two-count indictment today charging Eric Walters and Franklin Brown, both former police officers with the City of Marion Police Department, with using unreasonable force against a female citizen.    

Walters and Brown have each been charged with one count of deprivation of rights under color of law, specifically alleging that, while acting as police officers, each defendant used unreasonable force on the victim, resulting in bodily injury.  The indictment alleges that on April 2, 2013, Walters and Brown each used their respective tasers multiple times on the victim.    

If convicted, each defendant faces a statutory maximum sentence of 10 years in prison.  

An indictment is merely an accusation, and the defendants are presumed innocent unless proven guilty.  

This case is being investigated by the Myrtle Beach, S.C., Division of the FBI.  It is being prosecuted by Trial Attorneys Nicholas Murphy and Henry Leventis for the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division and U.S. Attorney Bill Nettles and Assistant U.S. Attorney John Potterfield for the District of South Carolina.

A federal court has permanently barred Ramesh Sarva, a certified public accountant in Little Neck, N.Y., from promoting and selling an alleged nationwide tax scheme, the Justice Department announced today.  Judge Josephine L. Staton of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California entered the permanent injunction order yesterday, to which Sarva consented.

According to the complaint, welfare benefit plans permit companies to pool together and make monetary contributions toward the purchase of life insurance for the benefit of each company’s employees or principals.  Participants in legitimate welfare benefit plans may be able to deduct the full amount of their plan contributions as a business expense.  The complaint alleged that Sarva falsely informed his customers that the welfare benefit plans he promoted were legal, but in fact, Sarva has been promoting plans that illegally permitted his customers to both claim substantial tax deductions for their plan contributions and later access the full cash value of their plan contributions by taking out loans against the life insurance policies purchased.  The complaint alleged that Sarva’s promotion of these unlawful welfare benefit plans deprived the U.S. Treasury of significant amounts of tax and subjected his customers to audits and IRS scrutiny.

The injunction order bars Sarva from promoting and selling any purported welfare benefit plans.  The court also ordered Sarva to provide the United States with a list of his customers and to send copies of the injunction order to his customers.

In the past decade, the Justice Department’s Tax Division has obtained more than 500  injunctions to stop tax fraud promoters and tax return preparers.  Information about these cases is available on the Justice Department 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.

Related Materials:

United States v. Kenneth Elliott, et al.
Complaint for Permanent Injunction and Other Relief
Stipulated Order of Permanent Injunction

The Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division (ENRD) today released its Fiscal Year (FY) 2013 Accomplishments Report, detailing its work alongside other federal agencies, U.S. Attorneys’ Offices, and state, local and tribal governments to enforce environmental and wildlife laws, protect our nation’s natural resources and ensure that all Americans enjoy clean air, water and land.

In the last fiscal year, the Justice Department continued carrying out its commitment to environmental justice to ensure the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental and natural resources laws and policies. The division’s work advancing the goals of environmental justice is illustrated in a separate chapter of the report.

“The Environment Division’s work to protect our air, land and water from pollution is as critical to our nation’s health, security, and sustainability as it has ever been,” said Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole.  “As we face significant challenges from climate change, in developing alternative and sustainable sources of energy and addressing pollution to protect public health and the environment, we are grateful to the division and its attorneys for the work they do each day on behalf of the American people and future generations of Americans.”

“As this report shows, every day, the division works with client agencies, U.S. Attorneys’ offices, and state, local and tribal governments to enforce federal environmental, natural resources, and wildlife laws,” said Robert G. Dreher, Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Environment and Natural Resources Division. “It also defends federal agency actions and rules when they are challenged in the courts, keeping the nation’s air, water, and land free of pollution, promoting military preparedness and national security, and supporting responsible stewardship of America’s forests, wildlife and other natural resources. The division also handles a broad array of important matters affecting Indian tribes and their members. Across all this work, we strive to ensure that all Americans enjoy clean air, water and land, implementing the department’s deep commitment to environmental justice.”

In FY 2013, the division secured over $1.78 billion in civil and stipulated penalties, cost recoveries, natural resource damages and other civil monetary relief, including almost $637 million recovered for the Superfund. The division obtained almost $6.5 billion in corrective measures, through court orders and settlements, to protect the nation’s air, water and other natural resources. It concluded 53 criminal cases against 87 defendants, obtaining nearly 65 years in confinement and over $79 million in criminal fines, restitution, community service funds and special assessments. Finally, the handling of defensive and condemnation cases closed in fiscal year 2013 saved the United States an estimated $6.8 billion.

Among other highlights included in the FY 2013 Accomplishments report: Accountability for the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill

The division’s top civil enforcement priority remains the ongoing civil litigation and trial stemming from the April 20, 2010 explosion and fire that destroyed the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico and triggered a massive oil spill. In December 2010, the United States brought a civil suit against BP, Anadarko, MOEX, and Transocean for civil penalties under the Clean Water Act and a declaration of liability under the Oil Pollution Act, as part of multidistrict litigation in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana.

Thus far, the department has secured over $1 billion in civil penalties through Deepwater Horizon settlements (with MOEX and Transocean), as well as far-reaching injunctive relief that should make Transocean’s deepwater drilling safer in the Gulf of Mexico.

The department tried the first phase of the U.S. case against the remaining defendants (addressing the cause of the disaster and liability) for nine weeks from February through April 2013, as part of a mass trial in which thousands of private plaintiffs also tried parts of their cases relating to liability and fault. The second phase of the U.S. case (principally addressing how much oil was discharged into the Gulf) took place over three weeks in September and October 2013. Both phases have been submitted to the district court for decision. The district court in New Orleans has scheduled the third phase of trial in this matter, addressing assessment of civil penalties, to begin in January 2015.

Addressing Climate Change

Over the past year, the division made important contributions to combating the effects of climate change. In January 2011, the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) regulations governing motor vehicle emissions of greenhouse gases took effect, triggering not only mobile source regulation, but also regulation of the largest stationary sources in accordance with EPA’s greenhouse gas tailoring rule. As of September 2012, the D.C. Circuit in Coalition for Responsible Regulation v. EPA upheld the agency’s greenhouse gas-related regulatory actions in their entirety. Challengers filed nine separate petitions for writs of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court. In July 2013, the Department’s Office of the Solicitor General, working closely with Division and client agency attorneys, filed an opposition to the petitions for certiorari. On Oct. 15, 2013, the Supreme Court granted certiorari on six of the petitions, which were consolidated and limited to a single issue: “Whether EPA permissibly determined that its regulation of greenhouse gas emissions from new motor vehicles triggered permitting requirements under the Clean Air Act for stationary sources that emit greenhouse gases.” The court denied the remaining three petitions, and rejected consideration of numerous additional issues raised by the petitions that were partially granted. In February 2014, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in the case.

In March 2013, the D.C. Circuit affirmed the district court’s decision in In re Polar Bear Endangered Species Act Listing, thereby upholding the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s 2008 listing of the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act as a threatened species throughout its range. The listing decision was based primarily on the polar bears’ dependence on arctic sea ice for their survival, existing and projected reductions in the extent and quality of sea ice habitat due to global climate change, and the inadequacy of existing regulatory measures to preserve the species.

In a settlement reached with the United States in September 2013, Safeway, the nation’s second largest grocery store chain, agreed to pay a $600,000 civil penalty and to implement a corporate-wide plan to significantly reduce its emissions of ozone-depleting substances from refrigeration equipment at over 650 of its stores nationwide, at an estimated cost of $4.1 million. The settlement resolves allegations that Safeway violated the Clean Air Act by failing to promptly repair leaks of HCFC-22, a hydrochlorofluorocarbon that has a global warming potential that is 1,800 times more potent than carbon dioxide. This first-of-its-kind settlement should also serve as a model for comprehensive solutions across a company.

Combatting Wildlife Trafficking

The department has long been a leader in the fight against wildlife trafficking. Over the last year, the department engaged fully in the administration’s effort to combat wildlife trafficking through its role as one of the three agency co-chairs of the Presidential Task Force on Wildlife Trafficking, established by President Obama’s July 2013 Executive Order—Combating Wildlife Trafficking. In the past decade, wildlife trafficking has escalated into an international crisis, making it both a critical conservation concern and a threat to global security. Beyond decimating the world’s iconic species, this illegal trade threatens international security. Transnational criminal organizations, including some terrorist networks, armed insurgent groups and narcotics trafficking organizations, are increasingly drawn to wildlife trafficking due to the exorbitant proceeds from this illicit trade.

The task force emphasizes the need for a “whole of government” approach to combating this problem and identifies three key priority areas: (1) strengthening domestic and global enforcement; (2) reducing demand for illegally traded wildlife at home and abroad; and (3) strengthening partnerships with foreign governments, international organizations, nongovernmental organizations, local communities, private industry, and others to combat illegal wildlife poaching and trade.

The division works with U.S. Attorneys’ offices around the country and federal agency partners (such as the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) to combat wildlife trafficking under the Endangered Species Act and the Lacey Act, as well as statutes prohibiting smuggling, criminal conspiracy and related crimes. In fiscal year 2013, a prominent example of the division’s robust prosecution of illegal wildlife trafficking was “Operation Crash,” an ongoing multi-agency effort to detect, deter and prosecute those engaged in the illegal killing of rhinoceros and the illegal trafficking of endangered rhinoceros horns. This initiative has resulted in multiple convictions, significant jail time, penalties and asset forfeiture.

Read more about the Justice Department’s involvement in the fight to end wildlife trafficking: www.justice.gov/enrd/6329.htm

The Justice Department announced today that the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana approved its settlement with the city of New Orleans regarding a housing discrimination lawsuit late yesterday. 

Under the settlement, the city agrees to permit the conversion of the former Bethany Nursing Home, located at 2535 Esplanade Avenue, into 40 units of affordable housing.  Half of the units in the new Esplanade complex will be designated as permanent supportive housing and will be reserved for formerly homeless persons with disabilities.  In addition, the settlement commits New Orleans to developing additional supportive housing for 350 persons with disabilities over the next three years.

“We are very pleased to have worked constructively with New Orleans to reach an agreement that will not only enable the Esplanade to be built, but that will also provide additional permanent supportive housing for 350 persons with disabilities in New Orleans,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels for the Civil Rights Division.

“Nondiscriminatory housing is a fundamental right of the citizens of New Orleans, and this settlement agreement continues the efforts to rebuild and improve a housing inventory ravaged by Hurricane Katrina,” said U.S. Attorney Kenneth Allen Polite Jr. for the Eastern District of Louisiana.  “I applaud the cooperative efforts of the city and the department to reach a resolution that is in the best interests of persons with disabilities, who are amongst the most vulnerable members of our community.”

In addition to the development of 350 additional permanent supportive housing units, the settlement requires that the city agree to provide all appropriate permits for the Esplanade, amend its Comprehensive Zoning Ordinance to allow permanent supportive housing, continue its work to prepare and implement a reasonable accommodation policy approved by the United States, conduct fair housing training for key city officials and be subject to reporting requirements.    

The State Bond Commission, which was also named as a defendant, is not a party to the settlement.  On March 20, 2014, the Bond Commission voted not to approve a settlement.  As a result, the Justice Department has moved to reopen the litigation against the Bond Commission and the court has scheduled a status conference for June 26, 2014.

The federal Fair Housing Act prohibits discrimination in housing based on race, color, religion, national origin, sex, disability and familial status.  Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act prohibits governments from discriminating on the basis of disability in administering their zoning laws.  More information about the Civil Rights Division and the laws it enforces is available at the division website

The Justice Department reached an agreement today with SK Food Group Inc., a company based in Seattle, resolving claims that the company used discriminatory document practices when verifying the work authority of non-citizens. 

The department’s investigation, which was initiated based on a referral from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), found that SK Food required work-authorized non-U.S. citizens to produce specific Department of Homeland Security documents to prove their work authority in connection with the company’s employment eligibility verification process, but did not make similar demands of U.S. citizens.  Such discriminatory practices are prohibited under the anti-discrimination provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).

Under the agreement, SK Food must pay $40,500 in civil penalties to the United States; identify and provide back pay to any individuals who suffered lost wages as a result of the company’s alleged discriminatory documentary practices; undergo training on the anti-discrimination provision of the INA; and be subject to monitoring of its employment eligibility verification practices for one year. 

“Employers cannot create discriminatory obstacles for work-authorized non-U.S. citizens in the employment eligibility verification process,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels for the Civil Rights Division.  “In this case, we commend the company for its full cooperation during the investigation and for its efforts to address and resolve the deficiencies in its employment eligibility verification process.” 

“No one who is legally authorized to work in the United States should be denied that opportunity based on suspicion or stereotypes,” said U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan for the Western District of Washington.  “The agreement filed today ensures training for human resource workers and outreach to employees to promote and safeguard equal treatment for all new workers.”

The Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices (OSC) is responsible for enforcing the anti-discrimination provision of the INA.  This case was handled by OSC Trial Attorney Luz V. Lopez-Ortiz. 

For more information about protections against employment discrimination under immigration laws, call OSC’s worker hotline at 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired), call OSC’s employer hotline at 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired), sign up for a free webinar at www.justice.gov/crt/about/osc/webinars.php, email osccrt@usdoj.gov or visit the website at www.justice.gov/crt/about/osc.

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

WASHINGTON - El Departamento de Justicia llegó a un acuerdo hoy con SK Food Group Inc., una empresa con sede en Seattle, el cual resuelve los reclamos de que la empresa usó prácticas documentales discriminatorias cuando verificó la autorización de trabajo de personas sin ciudadanía estadounidense.

La investigación del departamento, la cual se inició basado en una remisión del Servicio de Ciudadanía e Inmigración de los Estados Unidos (USCIS por sus siglas en inglés), encontró que SK Food requería que personas autorizadas a trabajar sin ciudadanía estadounidense produjeran documentos específicos emitidos por el Departamento de Seguridad Nacional para probar su autorización de trabajo en conexión con el proceso de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo de la compañía, pero no exigía lo mismo de los ciudadanos estadounidenses. Tales prácticas discriminatorias están prohibidas bajo de la provisión anti-discriminación de la Ley de Inmigración y Nacionalidad (INA por sus siglas en inglés).

Conforme al acuerdo de resolución, SK Food tiene que pagar $40,500 en sanciones civiles a los Estados Unidos, identificar y proveerles sueldos perdidos a cualquieres individuos quienes sufrieron una pérdida de sueldo debido a las prácticas discriminatorias supuestas de la compañía, y estar sujeta a supervisión de sus prácticas de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo por un año.

"Los empleadores no pueden crear obstáculos discriminatorios para aquellas personas con autorización de trabajo que no tienen ciudadanía estadounidense durante el proceso de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo," expresó la Asistente Interina del Procurador General de la División de Derechos Civiles, Jocelyn Samuels. "En este caso, nosotros elogiamos a la compañía por su cooperación completa durante esta investigación, y por sus esfuerzos para abordar y resolver sus deficiencias en el proceso de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo."

"Ninguna persona legalmente autorizada a trabajar en los Estados Unidos debe ser negada esa oportunidad basada en sospechas o estereotipos," expresó Fiscal Federal Jenny A. Durkan, del Distrito del Oeste de Washington. "El acuerdo sometido hoy asegura adiestramiento para trabajadores de recursos humanos y alcance comunitario para empleados para promover y proteger el tratamiento justo para todos los nuevos trabajadores."

La Oficina del Consejero Especial para Prácticas Injustas en el Empleo Relacionadas a Inmigración (OSC por sus siglas en inglés) es responsable de exigir el cumplimiento de la provisión anti-discriminación de la INA. Este asunto fue manejado por Abogada de la OSC, Luz V. López-Ortiz.

Para más información sobre las protecciones contra la discriminación en el empleo conforme a las leyes de inmigración llame a la línea directa del empleado de la OSC al 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY para las personas con dificultades auditivos), llame a la línea directa de empleadores de la OSC al 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY para las personas con dificultades auditivos), regístrese para un seminario por internet gratis al www.justice.gov/crt/about/osc/webinars.php, mándenos un correo electrónico al osccrt@usdoj.gov o visite el sitio web en www.justice.gov/crt/about/osc.

Los solicitantes o trabajadores que creen que han sido sometidos a requisitos documentales distintos basados en su ciudadanía, estatus de inmigración u origen nacional, ó a discriminación basada en su ciudadanía, estatus de inmigración u origen nacional en la contratación, despido, o reclutamiento o recomendación, deben comunicarse con la línea directa del empleado indicada arriba para recibir ayuda.

In recognition of the 20th anniversary of the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), the Department of Justice today announced a nationwide university tour by top administration officials to raise awareness of campus sexual assault.  From April 23-May 1, senior officials from the Departments of Justice and Education will visit campuses across the country, including public and private universities, community colleges, historically black colleges and faith-based and tribal-affiliated institutions around the nation.  Officials will speak with campus administrators, local law enforcement, community partners, local service providers and students about how best practices and lessons learned are playing out in areas such as prevention, public awareness and peer support.  Visits will also highlight the role that federal, state and local government, working with university administrators, faculty and students, should play.    

The federal government is proud to partner with hundreds of campuses across our country to improve safety for students with comprehensive solutions to both prevent acts of violence and to support victim services,” said Bea Hanson, Principal Deputy Director of the Office on Violence Against Women.  “The Campus Program is dedicated to building a future where domestic abuse, sexual assault, stalking and teen dating violence are eradicated.” 

Each campus on the tour is a recipient of the department’s Office on Violence Against Women’s “Grants to Reduce Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence, Dating Violence and Stalking on Campus Program.”  The Campus Program funds institutions of higher education to adopt comprehensive responses to domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking, creating partnerships among campus entities and with community-based victim services organizations and criminal and civil justice agencies.  Campus Program grantees must provide prevention programs for all incoming students; train campus law enforcement or security staff; educate campus judicial or disciplinary boards on the unique dynamics of these crimes; and create a coordinated community response to enhance victim assistance and safety while holding offenders accountable.
 
Since 1999, OVW has funded approximately 400 campus-based projects, totaling more than $139 million, to address domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault and stalking on campuses. 
 
Logistical details will be released closer to the event date.  The list of the campus visits is below:

April 23, 2014

Associate Attorney General Tony West
North Carolina Central University (Durham, N.C.) 

Principal Deputy Director, Office on Violence Against Women, Bea Hanson
Director, Office of Community Oriented Policing Services, Ronald L. Davis 
St. John’s University (Queens, N.Y.)

April 24, 2014
Deputy Attorney General  James M. Cole 
Principal Deputy Director, Office on Violence Against Women, Bea Hanson
Senior Counselor to the Assistant Attorney General, Civil Rights Division, Becky L. Monroe
Gallaudet University (Washington, D.C.)

Associate Attorney General Tony West
Loyola University (Chicago, Ill.) 

April 25, 2014
Associate Attorney General Tony West
United Tribes Technical College (Bismarck, N.D.) 

Acting Assistant Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels
University of Delaware (Newark, Del.) 

April 29, 2014
Associate Director, Office on Violence Against Women, Darlene Johnson
William Paterson University (Wayne, N.J.) 

April 30, 2014
Assistant Secretary, Office for Civil Rights, U.S. Department of Education, Catherine E. Lhamon
University of California Santa Barbara (Santa Barbara, Calif.)

Principal Deputy Director, Office on Violence Against Women, Bea Hanson
State University of New York (SUNY) at Stony Brook (Stony Brook, N.Y.)

Associate Director, Office on Violence Against Women, Darlene Johnson
Bergen Community College (Paramus, N.J.)  

May 1, 2014
Assistant Secretary, Office for Civil Rights, U.S. Department of Education, Catherine E. Lhamon
California State Polytechnic University, Pomona (Pomona, Calif.)

To learn more about the campus tour, please follow #SafetyonCampus through social media channels.

WASHINGTON—In an important step to reduce sentencing disparities for drug offenders in the federal prison system, Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday announced that the Justice Department will soon detail new, more expansive criteria that the department will use in considering when to recommend clemency applications for President Obama’s review.

In anticipation of the increase of eligible petitioners, the Justice Department is preparing to assign lawyers--with backgrounds in both prosecution and defense – to review the applications.

“The White House has indicated it wants to consider additional clemency applications, to restore a degree of justice, fairness and proportionality for deserving individuals who do not pose a threat to public safety,” said Attorney General Holder in a video message posted on the department’s website.  “The Justice Department is committed to recommending as many qualified applicants as possible for reduced sentences.”

Later this week, Deputy Attorney General James M. Cole is expected to announce more specific details about the expanded criteria the department will use and the logistical effort underway to ensure proper reviews of the anticipated wave of applications.

 The complete text of Attorney General Holder’s video message is below:

“In 2010, President Obama signed the Fair Sentencing Act, reducing unfair disparities in sentences imposed on people for offenses involving different forms of cocaine.

“But there are still too many people in federal prison who were sentenced under the old regime – and who, as a result, will have to spend far more time in prison than they would if sentenced today for exactly the same crime.

“This is simply not right.

“Legislation pending in Congress would help address these types of cases.  In the meantime, President Obama took a sensible step towards addressing this situation by granting commutations last December to eight men and women who had each served more than 15 years in prison for crack cocaine offenses.  For two of these individuals, it was the first conviction they’d ever received – yet, due to mandatory minimum guidelines that were considered severe at the time, and are profoundly out of date today – they and four others received life sentences.

“These stories illustrate the vital role that the clemency process can play in America’s justice system.

“The White House has indicated it wants to consider additional clemency applications, to restore a degree of justice, fairness, and proportionality for deserving individuals who do not pose a threat to public safety.  The Justice Department is committed to recommending as many qualified applicants as possible for reduced sentences.

“Later this week, the deputy attorney general will announce new criteria that the department will consider when recommending applications for the President’s review.  This new and improved approach will make the criteria for clemency recommendation more expansive.  This will allow the Department of Justice and the president to consider requests from a larger field of eligible individuals.

“Once these reforms go into effect, we expect to receive thousands of additional applications for clemency.  And we at the Department of Justice will meet this need by assigning potentially dozens of lawyers – with backgrounds in both prosecution and defense – to review applications and provide the rigorous scrutiny that all clemency applications require.

“As a society, we pay much too high a price whenever our system fails to deliver the just outcomes necessary to deter and punish crime, to keep us safe, and to ensure that those who have paid their debts have a chance to become productive citizens. 

“Our expanded clemency application process will aid in this effort.  And it will advance the aims of our innovative new Smart on Crime initiative – to strengthen the criminal justice system, promote public safety and deliver on the promise of equal justice under law.”

The full video message is available at http://www.justice.gov/agwa.php. 

William R. “Rusty” Miller, a real estate developer from Fairhope, Ala., was sentenced today in federal district court in Gulfport, Miss., for the unpermitted filling of wetlands near Bay St. Louis, Miss., in violation of the Clean Water Act, announced Acting Assistant Attorney General Robert G. Dreher of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division, U.S. Attorney Gregory K. Davis for the Southern District of Mississippi and Special Agent in Charge Maureen O’Mara of the EPA’s Criminal Program in Mississippi.

Miller was sentenced to serve 15 months, with nine months in prison and six months in home confinement, to be followed by one year of supervised release. Miller also was ordered to pay a $15,000 fine and to pay $19,246 in restitution. Miller was sentenced by Chief United States District Judge Louis Guirola Jr.

Miller pleaded guilty in December 2013 and admitted to having caused the excavation and filling of wetlands on a 1,710 acre parcel of undeveloped property in Hancock County, Miss., west of the intersection of Route 603 and Interstate 10. The charging document to which Miller pleaded guilty identified him as a part-owner of corporations that purchased and intended to develop the land.

According to the felony information, in 2001 when Miller and his companies acquired the property, he was informed by a wetland expert that as much as 80 percent of the land was federally protected wetland connected by streams and bayous to the Gulf of Mexico and as such could not be developed without a permit from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Wetland permits typically require that developers protect and preserve other wetlands to compensate for those they are permitted to fill and destroy. In spite of additional notice he had received of the prohibition against filling and draining wetland without authorization, Miller hired excavation contractors to trench, drain and fill large portions of the property to lower the water table and thus to destroy the wetland that would otherwise be an impediment to commercial development.

In pleading guilty, Miller has acknowledged that he knowingly ditched, drained and filled wetlands at 10 locations on the Hancock County property without having obtained a permit from the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers.

Hancock County Land LLC (HCL), the principal owner of the land, previously entered a guilty plea to related charges. HCL pleaded guilty before Senior United States District Judge Walter J. Gex III of the Southern District of Mississippi, who also imposed sentence. The corporation agreed and was ordered to pay a total penalty of $1 million, or $500,000 for each of the two counts. The corporation also agreed and was ordered to perform community service by completing wetland restoration and preservation plans ordered by the court. These require the defendant to replant with appropriate native vegetation the wetland area it excavated and filled, donate approximately 272 acres of the southwest quadrant to the Land Trust for the Mississippi Coastal Plain to be preserved in perpetuity, to fund its management and maintenance, to pay $100,000 toward the litigation costs of the Gulf Restoration Network and to pay a civil penalty to the United States Treasury for the amount of $95,000.

The case was investigated by the EPA’s Criminal Investigation Division. The case was prosecuted by Senior Trial Attorney Jeremy K. Korzenik of the Environmental Crimes Section of the Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division and Assistant U.S. Attorney Gaines Cleveland of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Mississippi.

A fourth U.S. Navy official has been charged in a complaint unsealed today with accepting cash, luxury travel and consumer electronics from a foreign defense contractor in exchange for classified and internal U.S. Navy information.

Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division, U.S. Attorney Laura E. Duffy of the Southern District of California, Director Andrew Traver of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) and Deputy Inspector General for Investigations James B. Burch of the U.S. Department of Defense Office of the Inspector General made the announcement.

Petty Officer First Class Dan Layug, 27, who enlisted in the Navy in September 2006, was arrested on April 16, 2014, in San Diego by special agents with NCIS and Defense Criminal Investigative Service. Layug made his initial appearance today in federal court before U.S. Magistrate Judge Karen S. Crawford in the Southern District of California.

According to the complaint, Layug received bribes in return for sending sensitive U.S. Navy information to employees of Glenn Defense Marine Asia (GDMA), a defense contractor. GDMA CEO Leonard Glenn Francis, 49, of Malaysia, had previously been charged with conspiring to bribe U.S. Navy officials, and GDMA executive Alex Wisidagama, 40, of Singapore, pleaded guilty on March 18, 2014, to defrauding the U.S. Navy. Two other senior Navy officials – Commander Michael Vannak Khem Misiewicz, 46, and Commander Jose Luis Sanchez, 41 – have been charged separately with bribery conspiracies involving Francis and have pleaded not guilty. On Dec. 17, 2013, Naval Criminal Investigative Service (NCIS) Supervisory Special Agent John Bertrand Beliveau II, 44, pleaded guilty to bribery charges for regularly tipping off Francis to the status of the government’s investigation into GDMA.

According to the complaint, Layug worked secretly on behalf of GDMA by providing classified ship schedules and other sensitive U.S. Navy information in exchange for cash, travel expenses, and consumer electronics. Court records allege that Layug used his position as a logistics specialist at a U.S. Navy facility in Yokosuka, Japan, to gain access to U.S. Navy ship schedules – some of which were classified – and other internal information, and provided this information to GDMA’s vice president of global operations. In exchange, court records allege, GDMA provided Layug with regular payments, some of which were delivered in envelopes of cash. The complaint alleges that on May 21, 2012, the vice president of global operations instructed a GDMA accountant that “at the end of each month, we will be providing an allowance to Mr. Dan Layug. Total of US $1000. You may pay him the equivalent in Yen. He will come by the office at the end of each month to see you.”

Court records allege that, in addition to his monthly “allowance,” Layug sought consumer electronics from GDMA. In an email on March 9, 2012, Layug asked the vice president of global operations “what are the chances of getting the new Ipad 3 [sic]? Please let me know.” In another email exchange on May 28, 2013, Layug asked the vice president of global operations for a “bucket list” of items including a high end camera, an iPhone5 cellular phone, a Samsung S4 cellular phone, and an iPad Mini. Shortly after sending his “bucket list” to the vice president of global operations, Layug stated in an email that “the camera is awesome bro! Thanks a lot! Been a while since I had a new gadget!”

In addition to consumer electronics, GDMA allegedly provided Layug and his friends with rooms at luxury hotels throughout Asia.

According to court documents, Layug allegedly undertook steps to conceal his bribery relationship with GDMA by, among other things, describing classified ship schedules using the code word “golf schedules” and opening a bank account in the name of his infant daughter into which he deposited portions of his “allowance.”

The ongoing investigation is being conducted by NCIS, the Defense Criminal Investigative Service and the Defense Contract Audit Agency.

The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Mark Pletcher and Robert Huie of the Southern District of California, Director of Procurement Fraud Catherine Votaw and Attorney Brian Young of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section, and Trial Attorney Wade Weems, on detail to the Fraud Section from the Special Inspector General for Afghan Reconstruction.

The charges contained in the criminal complaint are merely allegations, and the defendant is presumed to be not guilty unless and until proven guilty.

Those with information relating to fraud, corruption or waste in government contracting 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.

The Justice Department reached an agreement today with Potter Concrete, a company based in Dallas, resolving claims that the company engaged in a pattern or practice of document abuse in violation of the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA).

The department’s investigation, which was initiated based on a referral from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), concluded that Potter Concrete subjected non-U.S. citizen new hires to unlawful demands for specific documentation issued by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in order to verify their employment eligibility, while U.S. citizens were permitted to present their choice of documentation.  The investigation also revealed that Potter Concrete selectively utilized E-Verify to confirm the employment eligibility of individuals they knew or believed to be non-U.S. citizens or foreign born.  The INA’s anti-discrimination provision prohibits employers from placing additional documentary burdens on work-authorized employees during the hiring and employment eligibility verification process based on their citizenship status or national origin.

Under the settlement agreement, Potter Concrete will pay $115,000 in civil penalties to the United States; undergo training on the anti-discrimination provision of the INA; revise its employment eligibility verification policies; and be subject to monitoring of its employment eligibility verification practices for one year.

“Employers cannot create discriminatory hurdles for work-authorized non-U.S. citizens or naturalized citizens in the employment eligibility verification process, which includes the E-Verify program,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels for the Civil Rights Division.  “The Department of Justice is committed to protecting U.S. citizens and all work-authorized immigrants from document abuse.”

The Office of Special Counsel for Immigration-Related Unfair Employment Practices (OSC) is responsible for enforcing the anti-discrimination provision of the INA.  The statute prohibits, among other things, citizenship status and national origin discrimination in hiring, firing or recruitment or referral for a fee, document abuse and retaliation or intimidation .  This matter was handled by OSC Trial Attorney Ronald Lee and OSC Equal Opportunity Specialist Alexandra A. Vince.  For more information about protections against employment discrimination under immigration laws or how to sign up for a free webinar, call OSC’s worker hotline at 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired), call OSC’s employer hotline at 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY for hearing impaired or visit the OSC website at www.justice.gov/crt/about/osc .  

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

Sant Singh Chatwal, 70, of New York – a businessman operating several restaurants, hotels and a hotel management company – pleaded guilty in the Eastern District of New York to conspiring to violate the Federal Election Campaign Act (the “Election Act”) by making more than $180,000 in federal campaign donations to three candidates through straw donors who were reimbursed and to witness tampering. There is no allegation that the candidates participated in, or were aware of, Chatwal’s scheme.

Acting Assistant Attorney General David A. O’Neil of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice, U.S. Attorney Loretta E. Lynch of the Eastern District of New York, Assistant Director in Charge George Venizelos of the FBI’s New York Field Office and Chief Richard Weber of the Internal Revenue Service–Criminal Investigation made the announcement.

The guilty plea proceeding took place before United States District Judge I. Leo Glasser of the Eastern District of New York. As part of his plea agreement with the government, Chatwal agreed to forfeit $1 million to the United States.

“Chatwal admitted that he used straw donors to secretly funnel money to political campaigns so that he could gain access to the politicians, and he coerced another person to hide his crime,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General O’Neil.  “Chatwal went to great lengths to undermine both election laws and our system of justice.  Today’s guilty plea shows our vigilance and determination to prosecute those who damage the integrity of elections by masking the true sources of campaign contributions.”

“The Election Act’s spending limits are in place to limit financial influence in federal elections and to ensure transparency as to the identity of donors,” said U.S. Attorney Lynch. “Chatwal’s scheme sought to subvert the very purpose of the Election Act. Chatwal then rolled the dice to stymie the government’s investigation, thinking he could corruptly convince witnesses to his federal election crimes to stay silent. That gamble did not pay off. Today’s conviction sends a clear message that this office is committed to vigorously investigating and prosecuting individuals who are responsible for committing crimes in connection with federal campaign donations and witness tampering.”

“Attempting to buy elections through illegal campaign contributions is unacceptable. It is also illegal,” said FBI Assistant Director in Charge Venizelos. “Americans rightfully expect that elections will be free and fair. The FBI will continue investigating every case of abuse, wherever we find it.”

“Mr. Chatwal admitted his actions were designed to circumvent the Election Act,” said IRS-CI Chief Weber. “IRS-CI's ability to adapt our financial investigative skills to cases where they are needed uniquely equips our agents to defend and uphold America's trust in the fairness of the electoral process.”

The Election Act limits the amount and source of money that can be contributed to a federal candidate or to an individual candidate’s political campaign committee and multi-candidate political campaign committees, commonly referred to as “political action committees” (PACs). For example, in 2008, the Election Act limited primary and general election campaign contributions in a calendar year to $2,300 per campaign, for a total of $4,600, from any one individual to any one candidate. In 2010, the Election Act limited primary and general election campaign contributions in a calendar year to $2,400 per campaign, for a total of $4,800, from any one individual to any one candidate. The Election Act also prohibits making a campaign contribution in the name of another person, including giving funds to a “straw donor,” or a conduit, for the purpose of having the straw donor pass the funds to a federal candidate as the straw donor’s own contribution.

According to court filings and facts presented during the plea proceeding, Chatwal operated several businesses, including restaurants, hotels, and a hotel management company. From 2007 to 2011, Chatwal used his employees, business associates, and contractors who performed work on his hotels (the “Chatwal Associates”) to solicit campaign contributions on Chatwal’s behalf in support of various candidates for federal office and PACs, collect these contributions, and pay reimbursements for these contributions.

Further according to court filings, Chatwal and the Chatwal Associates induced straw donors to make these campaign contributions, promising them that they would be reimbursed. Chatwal orchestrated a scheme to make approximately $188,000 in campaign contributions to three candidates for federal office via straw donors, and he often arranged for the straw donors to be reimbursed through the Chatwal Associates, ultimately paying for the reimbursed contributions with funds belonging to Chatwal or one of Chatwal’s companies.

The evidence against Chatwal includes an October 2010 recorded conversation between Chatwal and a business associate who became an informant, in which Chatwal underscored his view as to the importance of political campaign contributions, stating that without campaign contributions, “nobody will even talk to you…That’s the only way to buy them, get into the system… What, what else is there? That’s the only thing.”

Also according to court filings, Chatwal sought to obstruct the grand jury investigation into his Election Act scheme by tampering with a witness, a person whose business performed construction work for Chatwal and Chatwal’s companies and who had recruited straw donors at Chatwal’s direction. In a June 2012 recorded conversation, Chatwal told the individual that if FBI and IRS agents approached him or his family, they should not speak with the agents and should instead refer them to a lawyer Chatwal would provide. During this conversation, the individual said that he would not tell agents that Chatwal gave him money to reimburse straw donors. Chatwal replied, “Never, never.”

A few days later, in a July 2012 recorded conversation, Chatwal directed the same individual to lie to agents about the Election Act scheme. Chatwal said he would pay for the individual’s legal fees in connection with the investigation and offered to conceal the money within a payment for work the individual’s company had performed for Chatwal. During the conversation, they discussed that investigators were seeking copies of campaign checks in the individual’s possession, and they then discussed that it was helpful that some of the straw donors had been reimbursed with cash. Chatwal added, “Cash has no proof.”

The case was investigated by the FBI’s New York Field Office and the IRS-CI. The case is being prosecuted by Trial Attorney Marquest Meeks of Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section and Assistant U.S. Attorneys Martin Coffey, Carolyn Pokorny, Robert Capers and Brian Morris of the Eastern District of New York.

A Georgia real estate investor pleaded guilty today for his role in conspiracies to rig bids and commit mail fraud at public real estate foreclosure auctions in Georgia, the Department of Justice announced.

Felony charges were filed on March 25, 2014, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia in Atlanta, against Mohamed Hanif Omar.  According to court documents, from at least as early as Sept. 1, 2009, until at least March 7, 2012, Omar conspired with others not to bid against one another, and instead to designate a winning bidder to obtain selected properties at public real estate foreclosure auctions in Gwinnett County, Ga.  Omar was also charged with conspiring to commit mail fraud by fraudulently acquiring title to selected Gwinnett County properties sold at public auctions.  Additionally, he was charged with making and receiving payoffs and diverting money to co-conspirators that would have gone to mortgage holders and others by holding second, private auctions open only to members of the conspiracy.  The department said that the selected properties were then awarded to the conspirators who submitted the highest bids in the second, private auctions.

“Today’s guilty plea is the fourth in the Antitrust Division’s ongoing investigation into anticompetitive conduct at public real estate foreclosure auctions in Georgia,” said Bill Baer, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division.  “The division remains committed to working with its law enforcement partners to investigate and prosecute local cartels that harm distressed homeowners and lenders.”

The department said that the primary purpose of the conspiracies was to suppress and restrain competition and to conceal payoffs in order to obtain selected real estate offered at Gwinnett County public foreclosure auctions at non-competitive prices.  When real estate properties are sold at the auctions, the proceeds are used to pay off the mortgage and other debt attached to the property, with remaining proceeds, if any, paid to the homeowner.  According to court documents, the conspirators paid and received money that otherwise would have gone to pay off the mortgage and other holders of debt secured by the properties, and, in some cases, the defaulting homeowner.

“Today’s plea should further serve as an example for those who would consider exploiting the processes in place regarding public foreclosures,” said J. Britt Johnson, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Atlanta Field Office. “The intent of the Sherman Act was to provide a level and competitive field within commerce and the FBI intends to enforce these types of violations.”

A violation of the Sherman Act carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison and a $1 million fine for individuals.  The maximum fine for a Sherman Act charge may be increased to twice the gain derived from the crime or twice the loss suffered by the victims of the crime if either amount is greater than the statutory maximum fine.  A count of conspiracy to commit mail fraud carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000 for individuals.  The fine may be increased to twice the gross gain the conspirators derived from the crime or twice the gross loss caused to the victims of the crime.

The investigation is being conducted by the Antitrust Division’s new Washington Criminal II Section and the FBI’s Atlanta Division, with the assistance of the Atlanta Field Office of the Housing and Urban Development Office of Inspector General and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Georgia.  Anyone with information concerning bid rigging or fraud related to public real estate foreclosure auctions in Georgia should contact the Antitrust Division at 404-331-7113, call the Antitrust Division’s Citizen Complaint Center at 1-888-647-3258, or visit www.justice.gov/atr/contact/newcase.htm.

Today’s charges were brought in connection with the President’s Financial Fraud Enforcement Task Force.  The task force was established to wage an aggressive, coordinated and proactive effort to investigate and prosecute financial crimes.  With more than 20 federal agencies, 94 U.S. Attorneys’ offices and state and local partners, it is the broadest coalition of law enforcement, investigatory and regulatory agencies ever assembled to combat fraud.  Since its formation, the task force has made great strides in facilitating increased investigation and prosecution of financial crimes; enhancing coordination and cooperation among federal, state and local authorities; addressing discrimination in the lending and financial markets and conducting outreach to the public, victims, financial institutions and other organizations.  Over the past three fiscal years, the Justice Department has filed nearly 10,000 financial fraud cases against nearly 15,000 defendants, including more than 2,900 mortgage fraud defendants.  For more information on the task force, please visit www.StopFraud.gov.   

Michael Garcia, a former detective with the Las Cruces Police Department (LCPD) in Las Cruces, N.M., who focused on child abuse and sex crimes investigations, pleaded guilty today in federal court to a one count information charging Garcia with violating the civil rights of an LCPD student intern when he sexually abused her while on duty.

According to court documents, as a detective, Garcia worked with students who participated in Las Cruces High School’s Excel program, through which students interned at the LCPD.  On or about May 4, 2011, Garcia took the victim on a ride-along in his department-issued vehicle to visit a crime scene.  Afterward, instead of driving the victim directly back to the police department so that she could retrieve her belongings and go home, Garcia drove her to a secluded location where he sexually assaulted her. 

As part of the plea agreement, Garcia acknowledged that he knew that his actions were against the law and that the victim did not consent to his behavior. 

“The defendant exploited his position as a sex crimes detective in a most deplorable way,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Jocelyn Samuels for the Civil Rights Division.  “The Civil Rights Division will continue to vigorously prosecute law enforcement officers who use their authority to engage in sexual abuse.  We commend the victim for having the courage to come forward, and we are thankful for law enforcement officers in this case, as well as the vast majority of others, who support and help victims of crime.”

In addition to a prison sentence, the terms of the plea agreement require Garcia to forfeit his law enforcement certification and comply with federal and state sex offender registration requirements.  A sentencing hearing has not yet been set.

This case is being investigated by the Las Cruces Resident Agency of Albuquerque Division of the FBI and the LCPD and is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Mark T. Baker and Holland S. Kastrin for the District of New Mexico and Trial Attorney Fara Gold of the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

Kimberly Banks, Donalene Mosely and Arneshia Austin were sentenced today in Albany, Ga., to serve 192 months, 37 months and 21 months in prison, respectively, for crimes relating to filing fraudulent income tax returns using stolen identities, announced Assistant Attorney General Kathryn Keneally of the Justice Department’s Tax Division and U.S. Attorney Michael J. Moore for the Middle District of Georgia.  After a weeklong jury trial, Banks was convicted on Jan. 14, 2014, of conspiring to file false federal income tax returns in the names of stolen identities, wire fraud, aggravated identity theft and theft of government money.  Mosely and Austin each pleaded guilty to conspiracy prior to trial.  In addition to their terms of imprisonment, the court ordered Banks, Mosely and Austin to pay $275,134 in restitution and to serve three years supervised release.

According to court documents and evidence introduced at trial, Banks, who is a former certified nursing assistant, obtained the names and Social Security numbers of nursing home patients from her employer and conspired with Mosely, Austin and others to use the stolen identifying information to steal money from the government in the form of tax refunds.  Several victims testified that they did not consent to the use of their names and Social Security numbers on these tax returns and testified that they did not receive any money from refunds generated by the false tax returns filed with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). 

The tax returns at issue were filed from internet protocol addresses assigned to Banks, and the fraudulent tax refunds were deposited onto prepaid debit cards that were mailed to addresses belonging to Banks, Mosely, Austin and others.  The evidence also revealed that Banks and others used the stolen proceeds to make payments on their car loans and on their mortgages, to throw a red-carpet party and to buy products online.  During the course of the conspiracy, Banks and her co-conspirators prepared 187 fraudulent tax returns that claimed over $600,000 in false refunds.

The case was investigated by special agents of the IRS-Criminal Investigation with the assistance of the Crisp County Sheriff’s Office.  Trial Attorneys Kimberly Shartar and Alexander Effendi of the Tax Division prosecuted the case.

More information about the Tax Division and its enforcement efforts can be found at the division website.

WASHINGTON – El Departamento de Justicia llegó a un acuerdo hoy con Potter Concrete, una empresa con sede en Dallas, el cual resuelve los reclamos de que la empresa cometió un patrón o práctica de abuso de documentos en violación de la Ley de Inmigración y Nacionalidad (INA por sus siglas en inglés).

La investigación del departamento, la cual se inició basado en una remisión del Servicio de Cuidadanía e Inmigracaion de los Estados Unidos (USCIS por sus siglas en inglés), concluyó que Potter Concrete sometió a los nuevos empleados que no eran ciudadanos estadounidenses a exigencias ilegales de documentos específicos emitidos por el Departamento de Seguridad Nacional, mientras que a los ciudadanos estadounidenses se les permitía presentar los documentos de su elección. La investigación también reveló que Potter Concrete usaba el sistema E-verify selectivamente para confirmar que las personas que Potter Concrete sabían o creían que no eran ciudadanos estadounidenses o que habían nacido en el extranjero, cumplían con los requisitos de empleo. La provision anti-discriminación de la INA prohíbe que los empleadores impongan cargas documentales adicionales a los empleados con autorización de trabajo durante el proceso de contratación y verificación de elegibilidad de empleo basado en su estatus de inmigración u origen nacional.

Conforme al acuerdo de resolución, Potter Concrete pagará $115,000 en sanciones civiles a los Estados Unidos, participará en adiestramiento sobre la provision anti-discriminación de la INA, revisará las políticas de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo, y estará sujeta a supervisión de sus prácticas de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo por un año.

"Los empleadores no pueden crear obstáculos discriminatorios para aquellas personas con autorización de trabajo que no tienen ciudadanía estadounidense o que son ciudadanos naturalizados, durante el proceso de verificación de elegibilidad de empleo, lo cual incluye el programa E-verify", expresó la Asistente Interina del Procurador General de la División de Derechos Civiles, Jocelyn Samuels. "El Departamento de Justicia se compromete a proteger a los ciudadanos estadounidenses y a todos los inmigrantes con autorización de trabajo del abuso de documentos".

La Oficina del Consejero Especial para Prácticas Injustas en el Empleo Relacionadas a Inmigración (OSC por sus siglas en inglés) es responsable de exigir el cumplimiento de la provision anti-discriminación de la INA. La ley prohíbe, entre otras cosas, la discriminación basada en el estatus de inmigración u origen nacional en la contratación, despido o reclutamiento o recomendación a cambio de un pago; abuso de documentos; y represalias o intimidación. Este asunto fue manejado por Abogado de la OSC, Ronald Lee, y por Especialista de Igualdad en el Empleo de la OSC, Alexandra A. Vince. Para más información sobre las protecciones contra la discriminación en el empleo conforme a las leyes de inmigración o para como registrarse para un seminario de internet gratis, llame a la línea directa del empleado de la OSC al 1-800-255-7688 (1-800-237-2515, TTY para las personas con dificultades auditivos), llame a la línea directa de empleadores de la OSC al 1-800-255-8155 (1-800-237-2515, TTY para las personas con dificultades auditivos), o visite el sitio web en www.justice.gov/crt/about/osc.

Los solicitantes o trabajadores que creen que han sido sometidos a requisitos documentales distintos basados en su cuidadanía, estatus de inmigración u origen nacional, o a discriminación basada en su cuidadanía, estatus de inmigración u origen nacional en la contratación, despido, o reclutamiento o recomendación, deben comunicarse con la línea directa del empleado indicada arriba para recibir ayuda.