{"id":1541634,"date":"2025-06-13T19:05:00","date_gmt":"2025-06-13T23:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/?p=1541634"},"modified":"2025-06-13T19:05:00","modified_gmt":"2025-06-13T23:05:00","slug":"four-plead-guilty-in-550-million-usaid-bribery-scheme","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/four-plead-guilty-in-550-million-usaid-bribery-scheme\/1541634\/","title":{"rendered":"Four Plead Guilty In $550 Million USAID Bribery Scheme"},"content":{"rendered":"

Four Plead Guilty In $550 Million USAID Bribery Scheme<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Four men have pleaded guilty to a\u00a0$550 million US Agency for International Development (USAID) bribery scheme,\u00a0<\/strong>which resulted in 14 contracts being improperly awarded to companies involved in the fraud, the Department of Justice announced<\/a> in a June 12 statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The U.S. Agency for International Development logo is covered with black tape in Washington on Feb. 7, 2025. Madalina Vasiliu\/The Epoch Times<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Robert Watson, 57, USAID contracting officer living in Maryland pleaded guilty to bribing a public official.\u00a0
\nWalter Barnes, 56, of Maryland and owner of of Vistant, pleaded guilty to commit bribery of a public official and securities fraud.
\nDarryl Britt, 64, of Florida and owner of Apprio, Inc. pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official.
\nPaul Young, 62, of Maryland – the president of a subcontractor to both Vistant and Apprio, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Vistant and Apprio are small businesses which were certified under the US Small Business Administration’s 8(a) contracting program – which helps small businesses deemed socially and economically disadvantaged.<\/p>\n

The bribery scheme began in 2013<\/strong>\u00a0according to court documents, which claim that while Watson was a USAID contracting officer, he agreed to take bribes from Britt in exchange for using his position at USAID to award contracts to Apprio – for which Vistant was a subcontractor in one of the awards.<\/p>\n

After Apprio became ineligible for contracts with USAID, Vistant moved up and became the subcontractor for USAID projects awarded through Watson’s influence between 2018 and 2022.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Both Vistant and Apprio have “greed to admit criminal liability,” and “engaging in a conspiracy to commit bribery of a public official and securities fraud,” according to the DOJ.\u00a0<\/p>\n

As the\u00a0Epoch Times<\/em><\/a>\u00a0notes further, during\u00a0the scheme, Watson is alleged to have received bribes from Britt and Barnes that were often concealed by passing the funds through Young.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cBritt and Barnes also regularly funneled bribes to Watson, including cash, laptops, thousands of dollars in tickets to a suite at an NBA game, a country club wedding, downpayments on two residential mortgages, cellular phones, and jobs for relatives<\/strong>,\u201d the DOJ said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe bribes were also often concealed through electronic bank transfers <\/strong>falsely listing Watson on payroll, incorporated shell companies, and false invoices. Watson is alleged to have received bribes valued at more than approximately $1 million as part of the scheme.\u201d<\/p>\n

All four individuals are scheduled to be sentenced at various dates between July and October. Watson is facing a maximum penalty of 15 years in prison, with the other three individuals facing a prison term of up to five years.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201dThe defendants sought to enrich themselves at the expense of American taxpayers through bribery and fraud,\u201d the head of the Justice Department\u2019s criminal division, Matthew R. Galeotti, said. \u201cTheir scheme violated the public trust by corrupting the federal government\u2019s procurement process.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Epoch Times reached out to legal representatives for Barnes and Watson but did not receive a response by publication time. The Epoch Times was unable to reach legal representatives for Britt and Young.<\/p>\n

Dismantling USAID<\/h2>\n

The Trump administration has been seeking to dismantle USAID.<\/p>\n

In February, then-presidential adviser Elon Musk said<\/a> President Donald Trump had agreed that USAID should be shut down.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cIt became apparent that its [sic] not an apple with a worm it in,\u201d Musk said. \u201cWhat we have is just a ball of worms. You\u2019ve got to basically get rid of the whole thing. It\u2019s beyond repair.\u201d<\/p>\n

On March 10, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said<\/a> the State Department had canceled about 83 percent of USAID contracts.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe 5200 contracts that are now cancelled spent tens of billions of dollars in ways that did not serve, (and in some cases even harmed), the core national interests of the United States<\/strong>,\u201d he said<\/a> on social media platform X.<\/p>\n

The department decided to keep the remaining contracts, numbering roughly 1,000.<\/p>\n

The administration also terminated<\/a> or placed on leave most USAID employees while shutting down the agency headquarters, which was taken over by the Customs and Border Patrol employees.<\/p>\n

On March 18, a federal judge ruled that Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency team likely violated the U.S. Constitution in seeking to dismantle the agency.<\/p>\n

The judge ordered that access for USAID workers and contractors be reinstated and that no further actions related to terminating contracts or workers be taken.<\/p>\n

The Trump administration is currently pushing a bill<\/a> through Congress rescinding $9.4 billion in federal spending, including USAID program<\/strong>s.<\/p>\n

The rescissions aim to cut \u201cwasteful foreign assistance spending at the Department of State and USAID and through other international assistance programs,\u201d according to a May 28 letter<\/a> sent to Trump by Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese rescissions would eliminate programs that are antithetical to American interests, such as funding the World Health Organization, LGBTQI+ activities, \u2018equity\u2019 programs, radical Green New Deal-type policies, and color revolutions in hostile places around the world,\u201d the letter stated.<\/p>\n

On June 12, the House of Representatives passed the bill. It now goes to the Senate.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Tyler Durden<\/a><\/span>
\nFri, 06\/13\/2025 – 15:05<\/span><\/p>\n

\u200bhttps:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/political\/four-plead-guilty-550-million-usaid-bribery-scheme<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Four Plead Guilty In $550 Million USAID Bribery Scheme Four men have pleaded guilty to a\u00a0$550 million US Agency for International Development (USAID) bribery scheme,\u00a0which…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":1541635,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1541634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","wpcat-1-id"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbimBl-6t34","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2025\/06\/image_922819729_0-UhHZs7.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1541634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1541634"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1541634\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1541635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1541634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1541634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bugaluu.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1541634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}