(Image source from: American Justice Notebook)
An Indian-American former chief executive officer of an Information Technology(IT) company, Future Net Group Inc, pleaded guilty for orchestrating a scheme to suborn an official from the city of Detroit, Michigan.
According to guilty plea, Parimal Mehta, 54, between 2009 and 2016 made multiple cash payments more than USD 6,500 to Charles L Dodd, the former Director of Detroit's Office of Departmental Technology Services. Parimal Mehta likewise pleaded guilty earlier for payoff in September 2016 cashed in the restroom of a Detroit area restaurant.
According to Crain’s Detroit Business, "Perry Mehta came to the U.S. in 1989 with a desire to do more than the civil engineering job he'd held with the state of Gujarat in India."
“As a civil engineer, working for a state government, I was not able to utilize even 5 percent of … (my) entrepreneurial drive,” Mehta told the Detroit Business. “I decided the land of opportunity was the United States of America.”
The final judgment in the case is scheduled for September 27, pleading guilty to one count of federal program bribery before United States Judge Robert Cleland of Eastern District of Michigan.
According to the plea statement, Mehta sought discriminatory treatment for an IT company FutureNet in exchange for the payoff he cashed to Dodd.
Among else things, Dodd was asked to cause FutureNet to be chosen to fill open positions for contract personnel and to enforce specific technology projects in several city departments. Mehta as well asked Dodd to render him with confidential data regarding Detroit's internal budgets for peculiar technology projects and personnel, which would welfare FutureNet in its dealings with Detroit.
According to officials, Mehta is named in an 11-count indictment in federal court in Michigan with five counts of honest services mail and wire fraud, one count of federal program bribery and five counts of unlawfully utilizing interstate facilities to commit bribery.
The lawsuit is being investigated by FBI's Detroit Division.
By Sowmya Sangam
