PENNSYLVANIA - A FilAm construction business owner pleaded guilty last August 28 for his role in defrauding a federal program designed to increase minority and small business participation in government contracts, according to the Associated Press.
Romeo P. Cruz, 59, pled guilty in US District Court in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania to criminal conspiracy charges related to a $121 million fraud involving federally funded highway bridge beam construction projects in Pennsylvania. He also pleaded guilty to a federal tax offense.
According to the AP, Cruz allegedly set up Marikina Construction Corp. as a front company for a Pennsylvania firm, Schuylkill Products Inc., and its subsidiary CDS Engineers Inc. Prosecutors said that Cruz’s company existed solely to qualify the two other firms for contracts meant for small and disadvantaged businesses.
The Pennsylvania Department of Transportation administered the contracts in question between 1993 and 2007.
The federal government gave Cruz’s company $121 million in enterprise contracts for disadvantaged businesses. Cruz would then pass all the work on to the Pennsylvania companies. For his role, Cruz in return would receive a fixed fee, according to the AP.
The two other men involved Dennis F. Campbell, formerly vice president of Schuylkill Products, and Timothy G. Hubler, former vice president of CDS Engineers Inc., have plead guilty and are awaiting sentencing. (www.asianjournal.com)
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