Sergey Nechaev, a dual U.S.-Russian citizen, was arrested December 2 in the Southern District of Georgia on charges related to the unlawful attempted export of two small aircraft to Russia. In conjunction with the arrest, the U.S. government also seized the aircraft.
A 41 year-old Chinese national with an an expired student visa has been arrested and charged with exporting firearms, ammunition and other military items to North Korea. Shenghua Wen was arrested December 3rd in Ontario, California.
The U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) today announced a $14,550,000 settlement with a German firm involved in smuggling a plastics plant from Austraiia to Iran. The out of pocket penalty for the violator is $250,000 to be paid within three months, with 27 quarterly payments of $150,000 thereafter. assuming the violator complies with the settlement and remains in business for the next seven years.
French and British authorities launched a joint investigation into suspected bribery and corruption at the aerospace and defense group Thales. Thales, Europe's largest defence technology firm, said the probe by the SFO and France's PNF financial prosecutor concerned a contract in Asia and focused on four entities in France and the UK, without giving further details.
A Florida Man was sentenced to 48 months in prison for conspiring to act as an agent of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) without notification to the Attorney General. Ping Li, 59, admitted that, from at least as early as 2012, he served as a cooperative contact working at the direction of officers of the MSS to obtain information of interest to the PRC government.
The founder and former chief executive officer of a California-based international logistics and freight forwarding company with offices in Grapevine, Texas, has pleaded guilty to conspiring to violate export laws by shipping goods to Chinese companies on the U.S. Department of Commerce’s Entity List.
The Securities and Exchange Commission announced that it filed 583 total enforcement actions in fiscal year 2024 while obtaining orders for $8.2 billion in financial remedies, the highest amount in SEC history. In addition, in fiscal year 2024, the SEC obtained orders barring 124 individuals from serving as officers and directors of public companies, the second-highest number of such bars obtained in a decade.
The U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) has announced a penalty of $1,104,408 against a U.S. citizen for 75 violations of sanctions targeting Iran. Between 2019 and 2022, they orchestrated a scheme to purchase, renovate, and operate a 19-suite hotel on the Caspian Sea in Iran.
An Indian national arrested in Miami was indicted for conspiring to export controlled aviation components with dual civilian and military applications to end users in Russia, in violation of the Export Control Reform Act. Sanjay Kaushik, 57, is also charged with attempting to illegally export a navigation and flight control system from Oregon to Russia through India, and with making false statements in connection with an export. The November 20 indictment was handed down in the District of Oregon.
An indictment was unsealed charging the former CEO of a bitcoin mining form with bribery violations and his company entered into a deferred prosecution agreement with the Justice Department. The November 18 indictment charges Zhengming Pan, former CEO of 500.com (now BIT Mining Ltd.), a Chinese national, with multiple violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). Simultaneously, BIT Mining Ltd. has agreed to resolve investigations by the U.S. Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) concerning related FCPA violations, involving bribery of Japanese officials. …
A Venezuelan man was sentenced to 30 months in prison to be followed by three years of supervised release for his role in a scheme to illegally procure aircraft parts from the United States to service PdVSA’s aircraft fleet in Venezuela, in violation of U.S. sanctions and export controls.
The owner of a California technology company pleaded guilty to conspiracy to violate the Export Control Reform Act for his role in a transnational, multi-million-dollar scheme to secure and illegally export dual-use semiconductors and other sensitive technology sanctioned entities in Russia.
The Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) has reached a settlement with New York City Based M&M Wireless Communications, and its principals over 94 violations of U.S. export regulations between 2019 and 2021. According to the BIS, M&M Wireless and its owners misrepresented key details in multiple export shipments of consumer electronics to the United Arab Emirates.
A citizen of Ukraine last residing in Estonia, was sentenced to 33 months in prison, followed by three years of supervised release, ffor his role in a scheme to violate U.S. export laws and regulations by attempting to smuggle a dual-use export-controlled item to Russia. A jig grinder is a high-precision grinding machine system that does not require a license to export to European Union countries, but does require a license for export and reexport to Russia because of its potential application in nuclear proliferation and defense programs.
Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) today announced a $178,421 settlement with American Life Insurance Company (ALICO), a subsidiary of MetLife, Inc. While Snoopy may no longer shill for the insurer, persistent compliance personnel kept an over-eager sales agent from creating greater consequences. ALICO agreed to settle its potential civil liability for 2,331 apparent violations of OFAC sanctions on Iran. The apparent violations related to insurance policies provided to entities in the United Arab Emirates that were owned or controlled by the Government of Iran.
Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) Export Enforcement published an updated version of Don’t Let This Happen to You!, a compendium of case examples highlighting BIS criminal and administrative enforcement efforts. The publication was last updated in July 2024.
Telefónica Venezolana C.A. a Venezuela-based subsidiary of Telefónica S.A. a publicly traded global telecommunications operator based in Spain, will pay over $85.2 million to resolve an investigation by the Justice Department into a scheme to bribe government officials in Venezuela to receive preferential access to U.S. dollars in a currency auction. Telefónica Venezolana entered into a deferred prosecution agreement (DPA) in connection with a criminal information filed today in the Southern District of New York charging the company with conspiracy to violate the anti-bribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA).
A Turkish National was arrested for his involvement in a complex scheme to violate and evade U.S. sanctions related to petroleum products from Venezuela and Iran.. The scheme included obfuscating the identities of tankers moving the oil by re-naming and re-flagging vessels, covering vessel names with paint or blankets, and turning off the electronics that track vessels’ locations for the safety of ships and their crews
A Virginia freight forwarding firm and two executives have been charged with operating a technology transshipment service for Russian customers, routing shipments through Turkie, Finland and Kazakhstan to evade export controls. “This company allegedly used not one, not two, but three different schemes to illegally transship sensitive American technology to Russia,” said Assistant Secretary for the Department of Commerce Export Enforcement, Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS), Matthew S. Axelrod
A federal grand jury in Boston indicted a citizen of the People’s Republic of China for allegedly stealing trade secrets from his employer, a global investment management firm, while working in Massachusetts in 2021. Xiao Zhang, 33, of Shanghai, China, was indicted on one count of theft of trade secrets. Zhang currently remains at large overseas.