Tag: All Regions

A trial looking into widespread bribery at the Tokyo Olympic organizing committee began Friday with a former head of a major ad company admitting to the charges. Shinichi Uneo, 69, who formerly headed ADK Holdings, quietly told the Tokyo District Court the allegations were accurate. In Japan, a trial continues even if a suspect admits guilt. Three prosecutors took turns reading their opening statement during a two-hour session. Ueno is accused of paying nearly 15 million yen to Haruyuki Takahashi,…

According to court documents, Jessie R. Benton, 45, of The Woodlands, schemed with another political advisor to funnel political contributions to a 2016 presidential campaign from a Russian national seeking to meet and take a picture with the presidential candidate. Benton arranged for the Russian national – whose nationality Benton concealed from the campaign and the candidate – to attend a campaign fundraising event and to take a picture with the candidate.

As such attendance and engagement required a contribution, Benton caused the Russian national to wire $100,000 to Benton’s political consulting firm to make an illegal foreign contribution to the campaign. To disguise the scheme, Benton created a fake invoice, which falsely identified the funds as payment for consulting services. Benton acted as a straw donor and contributed $25,000 of the Russian national’s money to the campaign, falsely identified himself as the contributor, and pocketed the remaining $75,000. Because Benton falsely claimed to have given the contribution himself, the relevant campaign entities unwittingly filed reports with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) that inaccurately reported Benton – instead of the Russian national – as the source of the funds.

In November 2022, Benton was convicted at trial of conspiring to solicit and cause an illegal campaign contribution by a foreign national, effecting a conduit contribution, and causing false records to be filed with the FEC.

An indictment was unsealed today in the District of Connecticut charging a Connecticut man and a foreign national with conspiracy, multiple counts of violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), and money laundering in connection with an alleged scheme to pay bribes to Brazilian officials to win contracts with Brazil’s state-owned and state-controlled energy company, Petróleo Brasileiro S.A. – Petrobras (Petrobras).  

For journalistic integrity, we note that podcaster Shawn Ryan has commented on this article: This is typical media today. How can people not see how biased this article is? The Canadian SOF unit was the only one offered a statement, neither Dallas nor myself was contacted in any way, shape or form. @ShawnRyanShow https://t.co/L1mfeppZ8y — Shawn Ryan (@ShawnRyan762) February 16, 2023 The Canadian military has demanded a U.S. podcaster remove parts of an interview with a former JTF2 commando as well as classified…

On January 24, 2023, the Federal Reserve Board (“FRB”) assessed a second-tier[1] civil penalty of $2.3 million against New York-based Popular Bank (or the “Bank”) for unsafe and unsound practices related to six Paycheck Protection Program (“PPP”) loans.  According to the FRB, the Bank processed and funded these loans despite detecting significant indicia of fraud……

Shortly before being elected leader of the Scottish National Party (SNP) in late 2014, Nicola Sturgeon embarked on a rock star-style tour of Scotland, appearing in front of packed audiences around the country, usually illuminated on stage by a row of blazing lights. On Wednesday morning, in the more sedate Georgian surroundings of Bute House, the Scottish first minister’s official residence in Edinburgh, Sturgeon announced her decision to resign as leader of the SNP and head of Scotland’s semi-autonomous government…

Ukraine faced its toughest week so far this year on the eastern front, where its defenders lost more ground to Russian forces but committed enormous resources to holding Bakhmut, a coal-mining town that has acquired emblematic importance to both sides. Russian troops have been launching probing attacks on a wide front in Donetsk, half of which they now occupy. But their main effort has been to take Bakhmut, whose eastern outskirts they hold. “[We are] storming house by house, square metre by square metre. Hard…

Michael S. Flynn was sentenced on Feb. 10 in Bridgeport, Connecticut to fifteen months’ imprisonment and restitution of $1,062,155 for his participation in bid-rigging and fraud schemes targeting public and private entities in Connecticut. This is the seventh sentencing arising out of the investigation into the insulation contracting industry.

Two Amazon marketplace sellers and four of their companies have pleaded guilty to price fixing DVDs and Blu Ray Discs. On Feb. 10 in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee, Bruce Fish of Hayfield, Minnesota, along with BDF Enterprises, Inc., a corporate entity owned by Fish, admitted to participating in a conspiracy to fix the prices of DVDs and Blu-Ray discs sold on the Amazon marketplace. Victor Btesh of Brooklyn, New York, and three New York corporate…

About this time last year, we offered some insight on Economic Espionage and Theft of Trade Secrets, which included a primer on economic espionage, case examples, and avoidance strategies.  We observed that “[w]hile the Office of the Director of National Intelligence has identified China, Russia, and Iran as the three states most capable of committing.