The U.K. Serious Fraud Office said today that a former Innospec business unit director was charged with conspiring to make corrupt payments to public officials in Indonesia and Iraq to secure sales of the company’s products.
Dr David Turner, 56, of Newmarket, Suffolk, was in charge of Innospec’s octane additives unit. He appeared today before the Westminster Magistrates’ Court. His case is transferred to Southwark Crown Court.
He was also charged with conspiring to defraud a competitor company by bribing Iraqi officials to provide unfavourable test results on its product.
The SFO said the alleged offenses occurred between 2002 and 2008.
Turner was given unconditional bail. He’s scheduled to appear in court on November 2.
In March last year, Innospec — a specialty chemical-maker based in Delaware — reached a $40 million global settlement of more than a dozen criminal charges in the U.S. and U.K., including FCPA and U.N. oil for food program offenses, and violations of the U.S. embargo against Cuba.
Innospec’s agent in Iraq, Ousama Naaman, pleaded guilty in June last year in Washington, D.C. to conspiracy and violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. He was charged in a June 24, 2010 superseding information with engaging in an eight-year conspiracy to defraud the United Nations oil-for-food program and bribing Iraqi officials. He’s waiting to be sentenced.
No Innospec employees have faced criminal charges in the U.S. in the case.
View the SFO’s October 25 release here.
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