Two owners of IT services companies were sentenced to prison Wednesday for bribing the former chief administrative officer of the Detroit Public Library in exchange for contracts.
James Henley, 44, of Detroit, and Ricardo Hearn, 32, of Royal Oak, Michigan, were sentenced to 27 months and 28 months respectively.
Federal district judge George Caram Steeh also ordered each defendant to pay the library $750,000 in restitution.
The DOJ said Henley and Hearn paid the former admin chief of the library, Timothy Cromer, a total of $1.4 million in kickbacks.
Henley and Hearn both cooperated with the DOJ in Cromer’s prosecution. In September last year, Cromer, 47, was sentenced to ten years in prison and ordered to pay the library nearly $4 million in restitution.
Henley owned Core Consulting & Professional Services. Cromer awarded Core an IT services contract and approved extensions and change orders. The library paid Core almost $2 million. Henley passed secret kickbacks to Cromer of over $650,000 in 2007 and 2008, the DOJ said.
Hearn owned Cubemation LLC. He paid Cromer $800,000 in kickbacks. In return, Cromer awarded no-bid contracts to Cubernation for library IT services from 2008 until 2010 worth $3.2 million.
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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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