Long Arm Of US Law Nabs British Solicitor.
A British solicitor, Jeffrey Tesler, was arrested at his North London business address after US authorities requested his extradition. US prosecutors have charged Mr. Tesler and another Briton, Wojciech Chodan, with taking part in a scheme to bribe Nigerian officials to secure lucrative natural gas contracts, according to the Times.
Both men are each charged with ten counts of violating the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and one count of conspiracy to violate the Act. The Act, as its name denoted is designed to prevent US business from paying foreign officials out of the normal course of legitimate government business – in back alleys or smoked filled back rooms – in order to sure a business advantage.
Mr. Tesler, for his part is being charged for allegedly helping to disperse bribe money for a construction consortium made up of four companies to Nigerian officials. The money was meant to secure lucrative natural gas contracts in the Niger Delta. The funds were allegedly funneled through a Gibraltar based shell company controlled by Mr. Tesler.
How much money are we talking about?
The consortium is alleged to have paid $132 million. In return, either outright or in part, it would seem that they were awarded a $2.2 billion contract to build the first two stages of a gas plant in December 1995.
Critical to the charges against Mr. Tesler is the nature of his relationship with the consortium – agent and principle. It would seem, if the allegations prove to be true, that not only did the consortium (principle) have full knowledge of his wrong doing, it was in fact at its behest that Mr. Tesler was acting.
It defiantly does not help Mr. Tesler that last month one of the members of the consortium, Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), plead guilty for its part in the bribery scheme and its successor company KBR LLC was order to pay a $402 million fine. Additionally, KBR’s former chief executive and chairman, Albert Stanley, who was dismissed in 2004, also plead guilty to charges relating to the violation of the Act last September.
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