By Jonathan Stempel
(Reuters) – A Connecticut oil and gas trader was convicted on Thursday over a nearly eight-year scheme to bribe officials at Brazil’s state-owned oil company Petrobras so two Connecticut trading companies could win business, U.S. prosecutors said.
Glenn Oztemel, 65, of Westport, Connecticut, was found guilty by a Bridgeport, Connecticut, jury on all seven counts he faced, including money laundering, conspiracy and violating the federal Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
Oztemel and another defendant, Brazilian-Italian oil and gas broker Eduardo Innecco, were accused of bribing officials to help Arcadia Fuels and Freepoint Commodities win contracts and learn confidential details about Petrobras’ fuel oil business.
Prosecutors said Oztemel paid more than $1 million in bribes that were split between Petrobras officials in Brazil and Rodrigo Berkowitz, a Petrobras fuel trader in Houston.
The defendants allegedly used coded language such as “breakfast,” “breakfast servings” and “freight deviation” to refer to bribes and bribe amounts.
Prosecutors said the scheme ran from 2010 to 2018. Oztemel worked at both Arcadia and Freepoint, before retiring in 2020.
“We are very disappointed in today’s verdict,” Oztemel’s lawyer Nelson Boxer said in an email. “Glenn has had an unblemished record for 40 years in the oil industry, and we will continue to fight to clear Glenn’s good name.”
Innecco is awaiting extradition from France to face U.S. charges. Oztemel’s brother Gary Oztemel pleaded guilty to a related money laundering charge in June.
Last December, Freepoint, based in Stamford, Connecticut, entered a deferred prosecution agreement and agreed to pay more than $98 million to resolve related U.S. bribery charges.
Brazilian authorities had investigated Freepoint employees as part of Operation Car Wash, a seven-year investigation into suspected bribery involving Petrobras.
Berkowitz pleaded guilty in February 2019 in Brooklyn to a money laundering conspiracy charge. He has yet to be sentenced, court records show.
(Reporting by Jonathan Stempel in New York; Editing by David Gregorio)
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