Federal prosecutors have extracted a measure of justice in an 11-year-old construction fraud against the last defendant: namely $3.8 million.
In United States of America vs. $3.8 million in United States Currency, filed June 8 in U.S. District Court, White Plains, the feds demanded forfeiture of funds traceable to a criminal scheme.
The criminal act was wire fraud, more precisely a “pass-through” scheme in which a company certified as owned by a woman is awarded a subcontract but does not actually do the work.
A forfeiture notice was published on a government internet site this summer and two Washington, D.C. law firms “known to the government to have a potential interest in the defendant” were directly alerted to the action.
No one claimed the money.
On Sept. 14, U.S. District Judge Cathy Seibel decreed that the ill-gotten gains shall be forfeited to the United States of America.
The only clues as to the underlying crime are that it involved Conti of New York LLC and the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge construction project.
In 2008, the Metropolitan Transit Authority awarded Conti, of Summit, New Jersey, a $193 million contract to replace the 69-year-old bridge, according to news accounts.
Conti was required to award 7% of the subcontracts to minority business enterprises and 3% to women-owned enterprises.
Conti received $8 million for materials to be paid to a business certified as owned by a minority or women.
But only a small percentage was paid to the certified subcontractor; the rest went to another company that actually supplied the materials.
The case records do not identify the businesses, but other court records reveal the players.
In 2014, Aaron Tubbs of Hastings-on-Hudson was charged with wire fraud for using a pass-through scheme on the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge project.
Tubbs was Conti’s regional manager and he had used a particular subcontractor to ostensibly supply steel for construction projects throughout the region.
The woman-owned subcontractor got a small fraction of the funds and the steel was supplied by another company.
In 2015, the government issued a deferred prosecution agreement, agreeing to drop the case against Tubbs if he satisfied conditions of “good behavior.” In 2016, the case was dismissed.
The Tubbs court documents allude to the owner of a minority business enterprise who was convicted of mail fraud in March 2013, “in connection with the investigation” of the Bronx-Whitestone Bridge project.
That individual appears to be Yona Jimenez, who owned and operated Global Marine Construction Supply, Rosyln, New York. She pled guilty to wire fraud in March 2013.
She was convicted for a pass-through scheme on a different job by a different general contractor — 2006’s $142 million Cross-Westchester Expressway project.
Yonkers Construction Co. hired her company to supply steel on a $6 million subcontract, according to court records, but paid her only $60,347. The rest of the money went to a Pennsylvania company.
Jimenez was ordered to forfeit $52,347 and was sentenced to time served, three years of supervised release, 300 hours of community service.
As to the source of the $3.8 million, Conti paid $4.2 million to “replacement” minority – women-owned companies, according to the case records. Then this past May, the government granted Conti a nonprosecution agreement, and Conti transferred the remaining $3.8 million of the original $8 million to the U.S.
