Man pleads guilty in $3 million Haitian bribery scheme

MIAMI – The former general manager of a Florida-based telecommunications company has pleaded guilty for his role in a $3 million Haitian bribery scheme.

Court records show 66-year-old Amadeus Richers, who headed Cinergy and Uniplex, pleaded guilty in Miami federal court Wednesday to conspiring to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. His sentencing is scheduled for Sept. 20.

Plea documents show Richers and others paid bribes from 2001 to 2004 to foreign officials employed by the state-owned Telecommunications D’Haiti and to a foreign official in the executive branch of the Haitian government in order to secure a favourable contract.

Richers is the ninth defendant convicted in the scheme. The first was in 2009, but Richers had remained a fugitive until being arrested in Panama this year and extradited back to the U.S.