Brazilian Airline Bribes Brazilian Officials – U.S. Collects Net $38.1 Million In FCPA Enforcement Action
Yesterday, the DOJ and SEC (see here and here) announced a parallel Foreign Corrupt Practices Act enforcement action against Gol Linhas Aereas Inteligentes S.a. (GOL) – an airline headquartered in Sao Paulo, Brazil with shares traded on the New York Stock Exchange.
The DOJ component involved a criminal information against GOL charging conspiracy to violate the FCPA’s anti-bribery and books and records provisions resolved through a deferred prosecution agreement in which the company agreed to pay net $15.3 million. The SEC component involved an administrative order against GOL finding violations of the FCPA’s anti-bribery, books and records, and internal controls provisions pursuant to which the company is expected to pay net $22.8 million.
DOJ Announces 2020 Criminal Charges Against Individuals In Connection With Alleged Marshall Islands Bribery Scheme
Last Friday, the DOJ announced that two Marshall Island nationals (Cary Yan and Gina Zhou – pictured) arrived in the U.S. after being extradited from Thailand based on 2020 criminal charges that the individuals violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (and other laws) in connection with an alleged scheme to bribe elected officials in the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) in exchange for passing certain legislation.
According to the indictment, Yan and Zhou acted as officers, directors, employees, and agents of a New York City based non-governmental organization (NGO) and, while in New York City and other locations in U.S. territory, to offer and pay bribes to government officials in the RMI to pass certain legislation that would benefit the business interests of Yan, Zhou and their associates.
Yet Another Individual Enforcement Action Involving Venezuela
As highlighted in this recent post, approximately 55% of individual enforcement actions on the DOJ’s FCPA website since 2018 concern non-FCPA offenses in connection with alleged foreign bribery schemes – most often money laundering offenses – and an astounding 37% or so of individual enforcement actions involve just one country: Venezuela.
Continuing this theme, the DOJ announced yesterday that a federal grand jury in Miami returned an indictment charging Rafael Rixon Rafael Moreno Oropeza (a Venezuelan national) for laundering the proceeds of substantially inflated procurement contracts obtained by making bribe payments to senior officials at Petropiar, a joint venture between Venezuela’s state-owned and state-controlled energy company and an American oil company.
Another Enforcement Action Involving Ecuador’s Seguros Sucre
From time to time, there are certain Foreign Corrupt Practices Act enforcement actions in which the core allegations just seem to “keep on giving” and spawn several related enforcement actions.
A prime example were the many FCPA (and related) enforcement actions involving Haiti Teleco from approximately ten years ago (see here) and the many recent enforcement actions concerning Venezuela’s PDVSA.
Enforcement actions concerning Ecuador’s Seguros Sucre S.A. (“Seguros Sucre”), an alleged state-owned insurance company and “instrumentality” of the Ecuadorian government are beginning to add up.
Glencore Resolves An Approximately $443 Million Net FCPA Enforcement Action
In mid-2018 Glencore (a commodities company incorporated in the United Kingdom and headquartered in Switzerland disclosed that it was under scrutiny by the DOJ. (See here for the prior post).
Specifically, the company disclosed:
“Glencore Ltd, a subsidiary of Glencore plc, has received a subpoena dated 2 July, 2018 from the US Department of Justice to produce documents and other records with respect to compliance with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and United States money laundering statutes. The requested documents relate to the Glencore Group’s business in Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Venezuela from 2007 to present. Glencore is reviewing the subpoena and will provide further information in due course as appropriate.”