Former BizJet Sales Manager Jald Jensen, 73, Pleads Guilty to Foreign Bribery in Decade-Old Case
The U.S. Department of Justice announced on October 30 that Jald Jensen, a former sales manager of BizJet International Sales and Support Inc., pleaded guilty for his role in a scheme to pay bribes to government officials in Latin America to secure business for BizJet. Jensen, 73, of Panama City, Florida, and previously of Van Nuys, California, entered his plea on October 29 in federal court in Tulsa, in the Northern District of Oklahoma, according to court records.
BizJet, headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma, is a U.S.-based subsidiary of Lufthansa Technik AG that provides aircraft maintenance, repair and overhaul services. Jensen was indicted in 2012, and the 11-count indictment was unsealed in 2013, when prosecutors believed he was living abroad. He made his initial appearance in Tulsa federal court in September.
According to the Justice Department's earlier filings in the case, BizJet executives paid bribes to officials employed by the Mexican Policia Federal Preventiva, the Mexican presidential air fleet, the air fleets of the Mexican states of Sinaloa and Sonora, and Panama's civil aviation authority, in exchange for help securing aircraft maintenance contracts. In some instances, bribes were funneled through Avionica International & Associates Inc., a shell company owned and operated by Jensen that purported to provide aircraft maintenance brokerage services but in reality laundered money related to the scheme.
Other defendants were resolved earlier: former BizJet president and CEO Bernd Kowalewski pleaded guilty in 2014, and former vice presidents Peter DuBois and Neal Uhl pleaded guilty in 2012. BizJet itself previously entered a deferred prosecution agreement and paid an $11.8 million penalty. A sentencing date for Jensen has not been announced.
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：位于俄克拉荷马州塔尔萨的佩奇·贝尔彻联邦大楼（Page Belcher Federal Building），俄克拉荷马州北区联邦法院所在地。G. Edward Johnson 摄，CC BY 4.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / The Page Belcher Federal Building in Tulsa, Oklahoma, home to the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Oklahoma. Photo by G. Edward Johnson, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
