In September 2024, Glenn Oztemel (previously employed by Arcadia Fuels Ltd. and Freepoint Commodities LLC) was found guilty at trial of FCPA and related offenses in connection with a Brazil bribery scheme. (See here for the prior post).
As stated in the DOJ release: “According to court documents and evidence presented at trial, Oztemel […] paid bribes to officials of Petróleo Brasileiro S.A. (Petrobras), the Brazilian state-owned oil and gas company, to obtain lucrative contracts for Arcadia Fuels Ltd. (Arcadia) and Freepoint Commodities LLC (Freepoint). […] With the assistance of others, Oztemel paid and caused the payment of bribes to Petrobras officials for their assistance in helping Arcadia and Freepoint to obtain and retain fuel oil contracts with Petrobras and by providing Oztemel and others with confidential information regarding Petrobras’ fuel oil business. Oztemel and his co-conspirators caused Arcadia and Freepoint to make corrupt payments — disguised as purported consulting fees and commissions — to a third party intermediary and agent, Eduardo Innecco, 74, knowing that Innecco would pay a portion of those funds to Brazilian officials, including to Houston-based Petrobras trader Rodrigo Berkowitz.”
In December 2025, Oztemel was sentenced by Judge Kari Dooley (D. Conn) to 15 months in prison. (See here). Judge Dooley however granted Oztemel’s motion to remain on bond pending appeal of his conviction to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.
The ruling stated:
The Defendant challenges two aspects of the jury instructions given at trial. The first challenge is to the Court’s aiding and abetting instruction as it relates to the FCPA counts and the extent to which the Court “charged out” of the case the issue of “domestic concern.” The second
has to do with the failure to include an anonymity instruction as to which subsection of the FCPA the jury concluded had been violated. These two issues intertwine because the question of which subsection was violated, may in turn, implicate the aiding and abetting charge. While the parties disagree as to the extent to which these issues were properly preserved, the Court is of the view that the issues, in an area of the law that is not well-developed, are substantial.In granting this motion, the Court does not revisit the decisions it has already made and does not opine on the question of whether the issues were properly preserved. Nor does the Court predict the outcome of the appeal. However, the question of whether the FCPA provides alternative
“means” for committing an offense, as opposed to separate crimes with separate elements, has not been addressed by any Circuit Court of Appeals. And although the Court applied what little guidance there is from other contexts, the outcome on this issue is not obvious. If the Defendant prevails on this issue alone, at a minimum, the case will likely be remanded for a new trial. Similarly, whether the Court’s failure to give an agency instruction in connection with the aiding and abetting charge was error, and if so, whether it was harmless, as found by the Court is also a substantial question. This Court has acknowledged on multiple occasions that the case was factually and legally complicated and raised a number of complex issues, some that had not previously been decided by the Second Circuit.Having decided that two of the issues raised on appeal are “substantial” the Court turns to whether the questions are integral to the merits of the conviction such that “a contrary appellate holding is likely to require reversal of the conviction or a new trial.’” As discussed above, if the jury instructions were incorrect, either ecause they were required to include an anonymity instruction or because the aiding and abetting instruction was incomplete, misleading or confusing, it appears, a re-trial would likely be required as to all counts of the Indictment.”
Recently, Oztemel’s opening brief was filed in the Second Circuit.
In summary fashion, it states:
“The district judge in this proceeding—where Glenn Oztemel was convicted on Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and money laundering charges—took pains to emphasize that “the case presents several novel issues of law” that “should be addressed by the Circuit.” Many of those issues resulted from legally dubious trial strategy decisions by the government that “injected extraordinary opacity into the trial and the jury charge.” Indeed, even after the district court grudgingly allowed jury instructions that it deemed “incredibly confusing” on six theories of FCPA liability that “conflate[d] all of the different mechanisms by which the Government is seeking to hold Mr. Oztemel liable,” the district court remarked: “If the jury convicts, maybe we’ll hear from the Second Circuit on that.”
For the reasons anticipated by the district court and for several more as well, this Court should reverse the judgment below or, at minimum, grant Oztemel a new trial. This was a sharply disputed case—steeped in the unfamiliar behavioral norms of global fuel oil traders—where the government offered paper-thin evidence that Oztemel participated in an illegal scheme devised by two other people (Eduardo Innecco and Rodrigo Berkowitz). The evidence that he engaged in any unlawful conduct within the statute of limitations was particularly deficient. To compensate, the government devised jury instructions modeled on a Rube Goldberg machine, with two distinct theories of primary liability each attached to two distinct theories of secondary liability, yet without essential guardrails to ensure a sound verdict. The result was an internally conflicting and highly confusing jury charge that contained numerous objective legal errors bearing directly on the main factual disputes at trial. Those instructions, moreover, failed to require unanimity on each element of the offense of conviction and misstated the standard for finding that Oztemel had knowingly joined the charged conspiracies. Separately and in combination, these errors in the jury instructions require vacatur of Oztemel’s convictions, not as a matter of legal technicalities but rather because they created a genuine and intolerable risk that Oztemel was convicted for conduct that was not in fact a crime.
Oztemel’s convictions cannot stand for two more reasons. First, the evidence of criminal conduct within the limitations period was insufficient as a matter of law to convict. Second, the government violated its disclosure obligations under Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972), in ways that severely prejudiced the defense in shaping trial strategy and cross-examining the government’s star witness on his key testimony. These errors are disturbing in their own right. And they confirm that when this case went to the jury—a jury whose instructions were flawed on the most crucial points—there was a clear and present danger of a legally unsound outcome.”
The brief highlights three issues presented, highlighted below with a summary statement.
(1) Whether Oztemel is entitled to a new trial based on highly confusing, contradictory, and legally erroneous jury instructions.
(2) Whether Oztemel’s convictions should be reversed because the evidence of criminal conduct within the relevant limitations period was insufficient to allow a rational jury to convict Oztemel beyond a reasonable doubt.
(3) Whether Oztemel is entitled to a new trial under Giglio because the defense did not learn of critical impeachment evidence concerning the government’s key witness until that witness had already taken the stand.
(1) The jury instructions in this case were highly confusing, contradictory, and legally erroneous in crucial respects. These errors, moreover, squarely implicated several of the most sharply disputed, outcome determinative issues at trial. On three separate grounds—the first arising from a failure to properly charge the substantive FCPA counts, the second arising from a failure to properly charge unanimity on the offense of conviction, and the third arising from an erroneous instruction on the legal standard for joining a conspiracy—these instructional errors require reversal.
(2) Independently, the government failed to offer legally sufficient proof that Oztemel engaged in any criminal conduct within the statute of limitations. Nearly all the evidence at trial concerned matters before the limitations period. Zeroing in on the pittance of evidence from within that period makes clear that no rational trier of fact could have properly found Oztemel guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
(3) In addition to advocating legally defective jury instructions and failing to offer evidence of a crime within the limitations period, the government also violated Giglio. Specifically, it withheld vital evidence about Berkowitz’s statements to FBI agents—evidence that would have powerfully shaped trial strategy for the defense, and that cut to the heart of Berkowitz’s credibility in testifying that he had discussed bribes with Oztemel and Innecco. By virtue of this violation, the government substantially prejudiced Oztemel. The proper remedy is to require a new trial.
