(Bloomberg) -- Ex-Vitol Group oil trader Javier Aguilar faces as much as 40 years in prison and will forfeit more than $7.1 million in two US bribery cases after entering a guilty plea in federal court.
Aguilar, 50, had already been convicted in Brooklyn, New York, in February of orchestrating an elaborate scheme to bribe Mexican and Ecuadorian officials, but he pleaded guilty to a second set of charges Wednesday, consolidating the two cases, federal prosecutors said in a statement. The move allows US District Judge Eric Vitaliano to impose the sentence in both prosecutions.
Read: How the Top Oil Trader’s Brazen Corruption Was Caught on Tape
In both cases — the second one was pending in Texas — Aguilar was accused of conspiracy, foreign bribery and money laundering. In Brooklyn, prosecutors alleged that he gave out cash payments at hotels, airports, and even in a parking lot as part of a scheme to win $500 million in business.
“With today’s guilty plea the defendant admits his role in the widespread corruption of the international commodities market and to casting aside laws and rules that apply to all to unfairly line the pockets of the few,” Brooklyn US Attorney Breon Peace said in a statement.
The five-count Texas indictment accused Aguilar, a former manager and oil trader, of colluding to bribe Mexican officials working for PEMEX Procurement International.
Ilene Jaroslaw, a lawyer for Aguilar, said the plea resolves all of the pending charges against her client.
“Mr. Aguilar acknowledged responsibility for his role at Vitol, and we have confidence that Judge Vitaliano will impose a fair sentence,” Jaroslaw said in a statement.
While Aguilar faces as much as 40 years in prison, prosecutors said in court documents that they won’t seek more than 20. Under his plea agreement, Aguilar has the right to appeal any sentence of more than 30 years and five months.
Vitol, the world’s largest independent oil trader, agreed in 2020 to a $160 million settlement with the US Justice Department over allegations that it paid bribes in three countries. Aguilar was charged that same year with orchestrating a five-year bribery and money-laundering scheme while working at Vitol’s subsidiary in Houston.
The trial in Brooklyn featured testimony from six men who pleaded guilty and cooperated with the US, including former officials at the state-owned oil companies of Ecuador and Mexico. The cooperators included middlemen who admitted funneling hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments for Aguilar.
The Texas case is US v. Aguilar, 23-cr-00335, US District Court, Southern District of Texas (Houston).
--With assistance from Patricia Hurtado.
(Updates with details on sentencing, plea agreement in eighth paragraph.)
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