The UK Serious Fraud Office said Friday that its £3 million ($5 million) confiscation order against former Alba chief Bruce Hall has been fully paid.
Hall, 61, was sentenced by a London court on July 22 to serve 16 months in prison for taking nearly $5 million in bribes when he worked for state-owned Alba, or Aluminium Bahrain B.S.C.
Hall was CEO of Alba from September 2001 to June 2005. He took nearly $5 million in bribes, the Serious Fraud Office said.
The court had ordered Hall to pay £3,070,106.03 ($5.1 million) or serve an additional prison term of 10 years on top of his 16-month sentence.
The SFO said Friday Hall also paid in full a compensation order of £500,010 ($840,000) to Alba and a further £100,000 ($168,000) as a contribution to prosecution costs.
Hall, an Australian citizen, spent 119 days in prison there before his extradition to the UK.
He pleaded guilty in 2012 to conspiracy to corrupt.
The SFO had alleged that Hall took bribes from Victor Dahdaleh, a dual citizen of Britain and Canada who lives in Belgravia, London.
Dahdaleh was formerly an agent for Alcoa. He allegedly bribed Alba officials in exchange for raw material supply contracts.
The SFO’s prosecution of Dahdaleh collapsed in late 2013. After two lawyers from the U.S. law firm Akin Gump who played a crucial role in the SFO’s investigation refused to testify, the SFO said it couldn’t continue the prosecution.
The SFO also said then that Hall had changed his evidence.
In January, a unit of Alcoa agreed to plead guilty in U.S. federal court to one count of violating the anti-bribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act with a 2004 corrupt transaction. Alcoa World Alumina LLC, a majority-owned subsidiary, paid a criminal fine of $209 million and forfeited $14 million to settle the DOJ’s charges.
Alcoa Inc., the corporate parent, also agreed to resolve civil charges brought by the Securities and Exchange Commission by disgorging $161 million.
The SFO’s August 1, 2014 release is here.
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Richard L. Cassin is the publisher and editor of the FCPA Blog. He can be contacted here.
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