Thirteen Khmer antiquities linked to art dealer Douglas Latchford are being returned to Cambodia, DOJ announced last week. The now-deceased Latchford was previously indicted for leading a scheme to sell "looted Cambodian antiquities on the international art market." In the indictment, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York alleged that Latchford sold the goods via false statements and fake provenance documents (see 2201110078). The items, which were housed in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, were repatriated by the U.S. Attorney's Office and the Homeland Security Investigations New York Field Office.
A Kansas business owner pleaded guilty Dec. 19 for his part in a scheme to violate U.S. export laws by filing false export forms and shipping "sophisticated and controlled" avionics equipment to Russian customers without export licenses, DOJ announced. Cyril Buyanovsky, owner of KanRus Trading Co. also agreed to forfeit over $450,000 worth of avionics equipment along with a $50,000 personal forfeiture. He faces a maximum of 25 years in prison.
An Oakland, California, resident pleaded guilty last week to illegally exporting firearms and other defense items, including night vision goggles. DOJ said Fares Abdo Al Eyani tried to ship the items to Oman from the Port of Oakland in 2019, but U.S. law enforcement stopped the shipment from leaving the country.
The U.S. this week charged Hossein Hatefi Ardakani and Gary Lam with export violations after DOJ said they helped illegally procure hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of U.S. and foreign-made components for Iran. Along with the indictment, the two were sanctioned by the Treasury Department for using companies across several countries to buy parts for Iran’s unmanned drone program.
Charles McGonigal, a former FBI agent in the New York Counterintelligence Division, was sentenced to 50 months in prison for his work with sanctioned Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York announced in a Dec. 14 news release. McGonigal in August pleaded guilty to violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, including by, following his departure from the FBI, investigating a rival Russian oligarch in return for payments from Deripaska (see 2308160029).
Furniture company Homestar North America will pay $798,334 to settle charges that it violated the False Claims Act by underreporting the value of its Chinese imports to avoid customs duties, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of Texas announced. Of the total penalty, $151,683 will go to the whistleblower in the action: Larry Edwards, a logistics and warehouse manager who worked for Homestar for a short stint in 2020.
Dallas-based importer ADCO Industries, also known as Dallco Marketing, settled charges that it violated the False Claims Act by avoiding customs duties on Chinese industrial product imports, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Northern District of Texas announced. The company agreed to pay $2.5 million to settle the whistleblower action, with $500,000 going to whistleblowers Donald Reznicek and Collen McFarland.
The U.S. last week seized three websites with a top level domain name operated by people sanctioned by the Treasury Department, including those with ties to the Lebanese branch of Hezbollah, DOJ announced. The websites are registered to domain name registry provider Verisign and are ctexlb.com, imarwaiktissad.com and russia-now.com. DOJ said people who operate the sites are listed on Treasury’s Specially Designated Nationals List and are listed as Specially Designated Global Terrorists.
Ghacham Inc., a Paramount, California-based wholesale clothing company operating under the Platini brand, was ordered to pay a $4 million fine and nearly $6.4 million in restitution for undervaluing its garment imports to avoid paying millions of dollars in customs duties, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California announced Dec. 8. The penalty, which also includes a five-year probationary period, was also levied for Ghacham's work with a woman tied to Mexico's Sinaloa drug cartel.
The U.S. charged Hans Maria De Geetere, a Belgian national, in two separate indictments for allegedly helping to illegally export "military-grade technology" from the U.S. to end-users in China and Russia, DOJ said. Along with the unsealing of the indictments in the U.S. district courts for the Eastern District of Texas and the District of Oregon, DOJ said the Belgian government arrested De Geetere, and others, and executed search warrants as part of the investigation (United States v. Hans De Geetere, E.D. Tex. # 4:19-cr-00207) (United States v. Hans De Geetere, D. Ore. # 3:23-cr-00374).