The U.S. is seeking the forfeiture of 35 Cambodian and Southeast Asian antiquities from a private American collection via the filing of a civil complaint in district court seeking to return the artifacts to their country of origin, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York said. The antiquities were sold by dealer Douglas Latchford to the current unnamed owner with false statements and fake provenance documents to hide the fact that the items were obtained via looting and imported through falsified customs documents, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. The collector voluntarily handed over the antiquities to the authorities.

Xiang Haitao, a Chinese national, pleaded guilty Jan. 6 to conspiracy to steal a trade secret from international agricultural biotechnology company Monsanto to benefit the Chinese government, the Department of Justice said. Xiang worked at the company, now part of Bayer, and its subsidiary, The Climate Corporation, during 2008-2017 as an imaging scientist. Monsanto and The Climate Corporation developed a digital, online farming software platform used to collect and store field data and bolster productivity for farmers, DOJ said. The Nutrient Optimizer was a key piece of this technology and ended up being the target of Xiang's trade theft efforts.

Former U.S. Navy sailor Ye Sang "Ivy" Wang of San Diego was sentenced to 30 months in prison and fined $20,000 for conspiring with her husband, Shaohua "Eric" Wang, to illegally export military equipment to China, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of California said. Ivy Wang bought military equipment for Naval Special Warfare units as part of her duties in her role as a logistics specialist first class assigned to the Naval Special Warfare Command in 2015-2019. In March 2018, Wang ordered a device for identifying U.S. military personnel in the field -- an item that was subject to Commerce Department export controls. Deployed in Iraq at the time the object arrived in San Diego, Wang told her command that the package containing the device was something she bought for her husband for a camping trip, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. Instead, she bought the device so her husband could resell it to China for a profit. In October 2018, Ivy Wang told agents interviewing her that her husband was illegally shipping military equipment to China. Even still, Ivy Wang took the device from her Navy command and gave it to her husband, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. Eric Wang pleaded guilty in 2019 to illegally selling export-controlled military equipment to China through his business and using his wife's Navy position to buy the equipment. Eric Wang also admitted to maintaining a warehouse in China to keep the equipment, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. “This defendant used her position of trust to put the Navy and the nation at risk, and the sentence imposed today holds her accountable for her actions,” acting U.S. Attorney Randy Grossman said.

Jorge Orencel, owner and operator of Maryland-based export business Sumtech, pleaded guilty on Dec. 17 to attempting to smuggle goods out of the U.S. without the required export license, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Maryland said. Sumtech, under Orencel's leadership. specialized in distributing "high technology laboratory devices," across the globe, but in particular to South America, Asia and the Middle East. Orencel was busted for shipping ionization chambers to Hong Kong, while telling the company he bought the chambers from that he intended to ship the goods to Argentina. Orencel also intentionally undervalued the chambers themselves, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

Ricardo Alberto Martinelli Linares pleaded guilty on Dec. 14 to conspiracy to commit money laundering as part of a massive bribery scheme that has already seen punishments doled out to Brazil-based global construction conglomerate Odebrecht S.A., the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York said. The conglomerate pleaded guilty in 2016 to violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act for a bribery and money laundering scheme in Panama. Luis Martinelli Linares, Ricardo's brother, pleaded guilty on Dec. 2 to the same misconduct.

Jose Rafael Vasquez, a resident of Dallas, was sentenced on Dec. 15 to 63 months in federal prison followed by three years of supervised release for attempting to export firearms, firearm magazines and thousands of rounds of ammunition to Mexico, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of Texas said. Vasquez attempted to leave the U.S. at the Laredo Port of Entry into Mexico in October 2020, when law enforcement found bundles of goods zip-tied to the bottom of his vehicle containing ammunition. After further inspecting the car, border officials found three AK-47 rifles, eight semi-automatic handguns, 16 handgun magazines and over 4,700 rounds of 7.62 mm ammunition inside the vehicle, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

Corporations need be careful and exercise due care when establishing their supply chains, said Assistant Attorney General Todd Kim while speaking Dec. 14 at the American Bar Association's National Environmental Enforcement Conference's Section on Environment, Energy and Resources. Kim discussed the DOJ's enforcement approach and mentioned the Lacey Act as an example. "If a corporate supply chain originates from a criminally-tainted source, then my division will consider the criminal responsibility of all parts of that supply chain," Kim said. "A corporation seeking credit for cooperation will need to identify all individuals involved in misconduct, including individuals outside the company in a supply chain. ... A corporation would be well advised to protect itself and its investments by exercising due care over its supply chain in light of the prospect of criminal sanction; the potential seizure and forfeiture of illegally-sourced timber, goods, vessels and other equipment; and the unavailability of an innocent owner defense."

The U.S. concluded the forfeiture of two large weapons shipments and one large cache of oil products from Iran following two cases in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, the Department of Justice announced Dec. 7. In 2019 and 2020, the U.S. Navy seized 171 Iranian surface-to-air missiles and eight anti-tank missiles, along with around 1.1 million barrels of Iranian petroleum products in the Arabian Sea in the largest-ever forfeiture of fuel and weapons shipments from Iran, DOJ said. Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps organized the weapons shipments, designated for the Houthi militia in Yemen. The Navy seized the weapons from two vessels during routine maritime security operations, DOJ said. The petroleum products were taken from four foreign-flagged tankers in or around the Arabian Sea en route to Venezuela, DOJ said.

Sang Bum Noh, owner of Los Angeles-based garment wholesaler Ambiance Apparel, was sentenced to 12 months and one day in federal prison for conspiring to undervalue imported garments and skirting millions in import duties, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California said Dec. 6. Noh also failed to report millions of dollars in income on tax returns and failed to report large cash transactions, the U.S. Attorney's Office said.

The chief financial officer of trucking and logistics company Roadrunner Transportation Systems until 2017, Peter Armbruster, was sentenced to two years in prison "for his role in a complex securities and accounting fraud scheme," the Department of Justice said in a Dec. 1 news release. "Evidence presented at trial showed that Armbruster inflated Roadrunner’s reported income by misrepresenting Roadrunner’s expenses. His actions caused the investing public to lose tens of millions of dollars when Roadrunner eventually announced that it would need to restate its previously filed financial statements, triggering a sharp drop in the company’s stock," DOJ said. "On July 29, following an 11-day trial, a jury convicted Armbruster of four counts of violating federal securities laws, including misleading a public company’s auditors, securities fraud, and keeping false books and records." Armbruster was indicted in 2019 (see 1904040023).