WASHINGTON – A former managing director of ITXC Corporation was sentenced today to serve five years probation, including three months of home confinement and three months in a community confinement center for his role in a foreign bribery scheme involving telecommunications contracts in Africa, Acting Assistant Attorney General Matthew Friedrich of the Criminal Division and U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey Christopher J. Christie announced.
Roger Michael Young, 48, of Washington, D.C., was also sentenced to pay a $7,000 fine by U.S. District Court Judge Garrett E. Brown for the District of New Jersey. Young was granted a reduced sentence based on his cooperation with the ongoing investigation into the foreign bribery scheme.
In addition, former ITXC Vice President Steven J. Ott, 49, of Princeton, N.J., was sentenced by Judge Brown on July 21, 2008, to serve five years probation, including six months in a community confinement center and six months home confinement, and ordered to pay a $10,000 fine. Ott also received a reduced sentence based on his cooperation with the investigation.
Young and Ott pleaded guilty on July 25, 2007, to conspiring to violate the anti-bribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the Travel Act in connection with the payment of approximately $267,000 in bribes in the form of illegal "commissions" to employees of foreign state-owned telecommunications carriers in various African countries. A third defendant in the case, Yaw Osei Amoako, pleaded guilty on Sept. 6, 2006, and was sentenced on Aug. 1, 2007, to 18 months in prison, a $7,500 fine and to serve two years of supervised release following release from prison.
Ott, Young and Amoako admitted in pleading guilty that they conspired with each other and other former ITXC employees and officers to make corrupt payments to employees of foreign state-owned telecommunications carriers so that those employees would use their influence to assist ITXC in obtaining and retaining contracts with the foreign carriers.
The case was prosecuted by Trial Attorneys Mary K. Dimke and Kathleen M. Hamann of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section, and by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Maureen Nakly and Paul Matey for the District of New Jersey. Assistance was provided by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The case is being investigated by the FBI.
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