A British businessman has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to corrupt, including making corrupt payments to Iraqi officials.

Dr David Turner (56), the former Innospec Limited Global Sales and Marketing Director (Tetraethyl Lead), appeared before His Honour Judge McCreath at Southwark Crown Court on Tuesday and pleaded guilty to three counts of conspiracy to corrupt.

The first two counts charged a conspiracy to give corrupt payments to public officials and other agents of the Government of Indonesia (between 14/02/02 and 31/12/08) and the Government of Iraq (between 01/01/03 and 31/01/08) as inducements to secure, or as rewards for having secured, contracts for Innospec from those Governments for the supply of its products including Tetraethyl Lead.

Dr Turner additionally pleaded guilty in respect of one charge of conspiracy to corrupt Iraqi public officials and other agents of the Government of Iraq (between 01/06/06 and 31/05/07) by making payments as inducements to ensure that tests on MMT, a competitor product manufactured by Ethyl Corporation, conducted by or on behalf of the Government of Iraq, concluded with an unfavourable assessment of that product.

The sentencing of Dr Turner was adjourned.

The case of two other Innospec executives, Dennis Kerrison and Paul Jennings, was adjourned until the 4th of April, 2012 for plea.

The SFO investigation into the conduct of Dr Turner was assisted by the US Department of Justice, the US Securities & Exchange Commission, the City of London Police and the Cheshire Constabulary.

(Source: Serious Fraud Office)

A former U.S. Army contracting official has been sentenced to 12 years in prison for his participation in a bribery and money laundering scheme related to bribes paid for contracts awarded in support of the Iraq war.

Eddie Pressley, 41, was also ordered to serve three years of supervised release following the prison term. The court in Birmingham, Alabama, said it would also require Pressley to forfeit $21 million as well as real estate and several automobiles.

“Mr. Pressley participated in a wide-ranging scheme to steer U.S. Army contracts to particular providers in exchange for personal, illegal profit,” said Assistant Attorney General Breuer. “Taking in nearly $3 million, he enlisted his wife to help him conceal the nature of his bribes and created phony paperwork to keep the scheme going. This sentence sends the message loud and clear that we will not tolerate corruption of any kind, and are determined to hold corrupt officials accountable.”

“This contracting scheme was driven by greed and is in no way representative of the vast majority of public officials and government contractors who work hard to serve our military,” said James McJunkin, Assistant Director of the FBI’s Washington Field Office. “The FBI will continue to investigate contracting fraud which deprives the U.S. government of taxpayer dollars, regardless of where it occurs.”

Pressley, a former army Major, and his wife Eurica Pressley, were found guilty at trial on March 1, 2011, of one count of bribery, one count of conspiracy to commit bribery, eight counts of honest services fraud, one count of money laundering conspiracy and 11 counts of engaging in monetary transactions with criminal proceeds.

Bank statements and wire transfer reports demonstrated that, in total, the Pressleys received approximately $2.9 million in bribe payments between 2004 and 2006, and used the money to purchase real estate, expensive automobiles and home decorating services, among other things.

A sentencing date for Eurica Pressley has not yet been scheduled by the court.

The case against the Pressleys arose from a corruption probe focusing on Camp Arifjan, a U.S. military base in Kuwait. As a result of this investigation, 17 individuals, including the Pressleys, have pleaded guilty or been found guilty at trial for their roles in the scheme.

(Sources: IEWY, Wall Street Journal)

Maersk Line Limited, part of the Danish shipping and oil group A.P. Moller-Maersk, has agreed to pay $31.9 million to settle claims that it overcharged the U.S. military for transporting cargo to support American troops in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The settlement resolves a whistleblower lawsuit filed by a former industry insider. The individual, Jerry Brown, will receive $3.6 million as his share of the settlement, according to the Justice Department.

Maersk blamed the mistakes in part on operating in war-time conditions that led to inaccuracies in documentation such as invoices and also that sometimes information was only partially reported or delayed.

(Sources: Reuters, Bloomberg)

Security forces in Sulaimaniyah City have detained two people on charges of forging Iraqi money, reports AKnews.

The two men were arrested by the security forces with fake money and arms in their possession, after another man who had been detained the previous day on similar charges admitted the charges and identified the other two.

The homes of the two men were searched and 1.95 million fake Iraqi Dinar were found, in addition to a color photocopy machine.

According to the statement, the security forces discovered other fake documents including identification documents, driving licenses.

The arms seized in one of the houses included an RPG rocket launcher, five RPG rockets, and an AK-47.

(Source: AKnews)

A retired major in the U.S. Army was sentenced today to 24 months in prison for engaging in money laundering of criminally derived property totaling $400,000, which he received from a contractor following his deployment to Kuwait, announced Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer of the Criminal Division.

Charles Joseph Bowie Jr., 45, of Georgetown, Texas, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Xavier Rodriguez in the Western District of Texas, San Antonio Division. In addition to his prison term, Bowie was sentenced to three years of supervised release and was ordered to pay $400,000 in restitution.

Bowie pleaded guilty in May 2011 to a criminal information charging him with one count of engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from specified unlawful activity. According to court documents, Bowie, a major in the U.S. Army at the time, served in Kuwait from April 2004 to April 2005, in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. While in Kuwait, Bowie conspired with John Cockerham, also a U.S. Army major at the time, who directed a government contractor to pay Bowie money in exchange for the award of a bottled water contract. As part of his guilty plea, Bowie admitted that he entered into a sham consulting agreement with the contractor in an effort to conceal the four $100,000 payments he received from the contractor between July 2005 and February 2006.

On Jan. 31, 2008, Cockerham pleaded guilty to participating in a bribery and money laundering scheme. He was sentenced on Dec. 2, 2009, to 210 months in prison and ordered to pay $9.6 million in restitution.

This case is being prosecuted by Criminal Division Trial Attorneys Richard B. Evans of the Public Integrity Section and Mark W. Pletcher of the Fraud Section. Assistant U.S. Attorney Susan Biggs for the Western District of Texas, San Antonio Division, is providing assistance in the case.

The case is being investigated by the Army Criminal Investigation Command, the Defense Criminal Investigative Service, the FBI, the Internal Revenue Service, the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations and the International Contract Corruption Task Force.

(Source: US Department of Justice)

Iraq has improved its position in Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index from 4th worst to joint 8th worst.

This places it ahead of Somalia, North Korea, Burma (Myanmar), Afghanistan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and Sudan, and on a par with Haiti.

The improvement is to praised, but being behind countries such as Venezuela, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Zimbabwe, is hardly cause for celebration.

Rahim Hassan al-Uqailee [Judge Rahim al-Akili; al-Ugeily], stepped down as head of Iraq’s Integrity Commission in September, sharply criticising interference in his inquiries, and saying he had lost political support for his anti-corruption efforts since the beginning of the year.

Iraq has recently participated in an Arab workshop on combating financial and administrative corruption in governmental and private institutions, according to a report from Aswat al-Iraq.

The Jordanian al-Arab daily said that Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Oman and Jordan are participating in the workshop in Amman, Jordan, that tackles combating corruption with new technologies and the role of governmental institutions in such moves.

The 4-day workshop is organized by Ro’yah International for Human Resources Development in cooperation with anti-corruption Authority.

Corruption is one of the main obstacles that are facing the reconstruction of Iraq, where there are hundreds of cases at the Integrity Commission waiting to be investigated.

(Source: Aswat al-Iraq)

The reports by the Transparency International over the corruption in Iraq are not “precise”, an advisor to the Iraqi government said on Friday, according to AKnews.

The annual survey by the Berlin-based organization listed Somalia, Myanmar, Afghanistan, and Iraq as perceived to be the most corrupt, with Denmark, New Zealand, Singapore, Finland, and Canada perceived to be the world’s least corrupt countries.

Economics advisor, Salam al-Qurayshi, told AKnews that the data upon which the organization has based its conclusions have not been taken from official governmental bodies and the independent Iraqi Integrity Board.

“The organization does not have a base in Iraq and its data on Iraq was based on information by those local and foreign companies who failed to implement service projects in the country.”

(Source: AKnews)