By Jonathan Stempel
(Reuters) – A Connecticut oil and gasoline dealer was convicted on Thursday over a virtually eight-year scheme to bribe officers at Brazil’s state-owned oil firm Petrobras so two Connecticut buying and selling firms may win enterprise, U.S. prosecutors stated.
Glenn Oztemel, 65, of Westport, Connecticut, was discovered responsible by a Bridgeport, Connecticut, jury on all seven counts he confronted, together with cash laundering, conspiracy and violating the federal International Corrupt Practices Act.
Oztemel and one other defendant, Brazilian-Italian oil and gasoline dealer Eduardo Innecco, have been accused of bribing officers to assist Arcadia Fuels and Freepoint Commodities win contracts and study confidential particulars about Petrobras’ gasoline oil enterprise.
Prosecutors stated Oztemel paid greater than $1 million in bribes that have been cut up between Petrobras officers in Brazil and Rodrigo Berkowitz, a Petrobras gasoline dealer in Houston.
The defendants allegedly used coded language corresponding to “breakfast,” “breakfast servings” and “freight deviation” to check with bribes and bribe quantities.
Prosecutors stated the scheme ran from 2010 to 2018. Oztemel labored at each Arcadia and Freepoint, earlier than retiring in 2020.
“We are very disappointed in today’s verdict,” Oztemel’s lawyer Nelson Boxer stated in an e-mail. “Glenn has had an unblemished record for 40 years in the oil industry, and we will continue to fight to clear Glenn’s good name.”
Innecco is awaiting extradition from France to face U.S. prices. Oztemel’s brother Gary Oztemel pleaded responsible to a associated cash laundering cost in June.
Final December, Freepoint, based mostly in Stamford, Connecticut, entered a deferred prosecution settlement and agreed to pay greater than $98 million to resolve associated U.S. bribery prices.
Brazilian authorities had investigated Freepoint workers as a part of Operation Automobile Wash, a seven-year investigation into suspected bribery involving Petrobras.
Berkowitz pleaded responsible in February 2019 in Brooklyn to a cash laundering conspiracy cost. He has but to be sentenced, court docket information present.
