Arms dealers to Sudan & Iraq; Pennsylvanian sentenced for torture & arms to Iraq; DPRK diplomat money laundering
The president of Orlando, Florida-based steel trading firm Metalhouse LLC, was sentenced to six years in prison for conspiracy to commit money laundering to promote violations of U.S. sanctions against Sergey Kurchenko, a pro-Russian Ukrainian oligarch. A business associate, a Belarusian national residing in Miami, was sentenced to 21 months in prison for his role in the scheme.
Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) Chair Erica Y. Williams announced a record $25 million fine sanctioning KPMG Netherlands for widespread improper answer sharing and the firm's multiple misrepresentations about its knowledge of the misconduct.
Wednesday Senators Mitt Romney (R-UT) and Maggie Hassan (D-NH), introduced bipartisan legislation to bolster the Export Enforcement Coordination Center—an interagency hub for information sharing and coordination among the key agencies responsible for export control enforcement. At a hearing Thursday, officials from Commerce, Justice and Homeland Security were unanimous in their call for resources from Congress.
Two Russian nationals pleaded guilty last week to conspiracy to violate the Export Control Reform Act (ECRA) in connection with a scheme to acquire and unlawfully export controlled aviation technology to Russian end users. Beginning in or about May 2022 through May 2023, the defendants conspired to obtain orders for various aircraft parts and components from Russian buyers – primarily commercial airline companies – and then fulfill those requests by acquiring the parts from the United States suppliers.
Commerce's Bureau of Industry and Security has published an updated version of “Don’t Let This Happen to You ," a compendium of case examples highlighting their criminal and administrative enforcement efforts.
A California man was sentanced for attempting to ship firearms and night-vision equipment to the Sultanate of Oman. He attempted to conceal the firearms by disassembling them, wrapping them in aluminum foil, and then secreting them within automobiles inside the shipping container.
Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement Matthew Axelrod announced four new Enforcement Initiatives at the 2024 Update Conference on Export Controls and Policy. In his plenary address, Mr. Axelrod introduced new guidance for the Freight Forwarder community, an updated compendium of enforcement examples, an antiboycott blacklist, and enhanced outreach to manufacturers and distributors of restricted good discovered on the battlefield in Ukraine.
The Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) has published a document containing updated guidance and best practices for freight forwarders and exporters who use freight forwarders to help them ensure compliance with U.S. export controls and regulatory requirements.
Swiss commodity broker Trafigura pleaded guilty to crimes related to bribing Brazilian officials of the state owned oil company Petrobras, the Justice Department announced March 28. The $126 million settlement noted the firm's extensive prior misconduct, as well that "Trafigura was slow to exercise disciplinary and remedial measures," and "Trafigura failed to preserve and produce certain documents and evidence in a timely manner and, at times, took positions that were inconsistent with full cooperation."
The Latvian partner of a Kansas avionics distributor has been indicted for his role in a years-long scheme to sell sophisticated avionics equipment to Russian companies, in violation of U.S. export laws. The defendant is the third to be arrested and charged in connection with the conspiracy led by a Kansas company and two U.S. nationals, originally reported on March of 2023
A federal grand jury in the Southern District of Florida returned an indictment March 18 charging a former finance director of the Latin America division of Stericycle Inc., an international waste management company headquartered in Lake Forest, Illinois, for his role in an alleged scheme to pay over $10 million in bribes to foreign officials in Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina. According to court documents, between 2011 and 2016, Abraham Cigarroa Cervantes, 51, of Mexico, and others allegedly caused hundreds of bribe payments to be made to government officials in Brazil, Mexico, and Argentina to obtain and retain business and to secure improper advantages for Stericycle, a U.S. securities issuer, in connection with providing waste management services.
A Canadian national was arrested in New York, for conspiring to send to undercover law enforcement officers trade secrets that belonged to his previous employer, Tesla Motors Canada subsidiary Hibar Systems Ltd. Klaus Pflugbeil and Yilong Shao allegedly used stolen confidential information – developed by Hibar – to establish their own Chinese-based competitor.
March 7th, the Justice Department published its revision of the National Security Division Enforcement Policy, This Enforcement Policy sets forth the criteria that NSD, in partnership with U.S. Attorneys’ Offices and other Department litigating components, uses in determining an appropriate resolution for organizations that make a voluntary self-disclosure in export control and sanctions matters.
Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) today announced a settlement with EFG International AG, a Switzerland-based global private banking group. EFG has agreed to pay $3,740,442 to settle its potential civil liability for processing 873 securities transactions in apparent violation of the Cuban Asset Control Regulations, the Kingpin Act, and Executive Order 14024. The settlement amount reflects OFAC’s determination that EFG’s apparent violations were voluntarily self-disclosed and were non-egregious.
FinCEN is issuing a proposed rule to require certain persons involved in real estate closings and settlements to submit reports and keep records on identified non-financed transfers of residential real property to specified legal entities and trusts on a nationwide basis.
A federal criminal complaint was unsealed Monday charging two men with conspiring to purchase and illegally export millions of dollars’ worth of fully automatic rifles, grenade launchers, Stinger missile systems, hand grenades, sniper rifles, ammunition, and other export-controlled items from the United States to South Sudan, in violation of the Arms Export Control Act (AECA) and the Export Control Reform Act (ECRA).
A federal grand jury indicted a Chinese national, charging him with four counts of theft of trade secrets in connection with an alleged plan to steal from Google LLC (Google) proprietary information related to artificial intelligence (AI) technology. According to the indictment, returned on March 5, Linwei Ding, aka Leon Ding, 38, a national of the People’s Republic of China and resident of Newark, California, transferred sensitive Google trade secrets and other confidential information from Google’s network to his personal account while secretly affiliating himself with PRC-based companies in the AI industry. Ding was arrested March 6th.
A California fashion company executive was sentenced today to 48 months in federal prison for undervaluing imported garments in a scheme to avoid paying millions of dollars in customs duties. The Executive's company, Ghacham Inc., which does business under the “Platini” brand name, imported clothing from China and submitted fraudulent invoices to U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) that undervalued the shipments, allowing the company to avoid paying the full amounts of tariffs owed on the imports.
A Russian national based in Hong Kong pleaded guilty to money laundering and smuggling charges for illicitly procuring dual-use, military-grade microelectronics for export to Russia, Members of the conspiracy procured these sensitive microelectronics by falsely representing to the U.S. distributors (who, in turn, are required to report to U.S. agencies) that the Hong Kong shell entity was sending the shipments to end users located in China, Hong Kong, and other countries outside of Russia for use in electron microscopes for medical research. In reality, the OLED micro-displays were destined for end users in Russia.
