FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
AUGUST 10, 2007
WWW.USDOJ.GOV/USAO/MA
CONTACT: CHRISTINA DiIORIO-STERLING
PHONE: (617)748-3356
E-MAIL: USAMA.MEDIA@USDOJ.GOV
P.A. LANDERS, INC. AND COMPANY PRINCIPALS SENTENCED FOR
DEFRAUDING THE COMMONWEALTH ON PAVING PROJECTS
Boston, MA...A Plymouth road construction company and two of its principals were sentenced yesterday for conspiring to defraud the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and several of its municipalities by generating fake and inflated asphalt weight tickets on government-funded paving projects.
United States Attorney Michael J. Sullivan, Theodore L. Doherty III, Special Agent in Charge of the New England Regional Office of the U.S. Department of Transportation, Office of Inspector General, and Douglas A. Bricker, Special Agent in Charge of the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation Boston Field Office, announced that P.A. LANDERS, INC., was sentenced to four years’ probation and ordered to pay a fine of $3 million.
The company’s former President and CEO, PRESTON A. LANDERS, age 56, of Hanover, Massachusetts, was sentenced to 42 months’ imprisonment, to be followed by 2 years supervised release and a fine of $150,000. The former Vice President GREGORY R. KEELAN, age 49, of Pembroke, Massachusetts, was sentenced to 30 months’ imprisonment, to be followed by 2 years supervised release and a fine of $10,000. P.A. LANDERS, INC., KEELAN and LANDERS were also ordered to pay $332, 686 in restitution.
On May 9, 2007, the three defendants were found guilty by a jury of Conspiring to Defraud the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and several of its municipalities, and Using the Mails to Defraud the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and Several of its Municipalities.
From 1996 through at least March, 2003, the defendants generated fake and inflated asphalt weight tickets on government-funded paving projects on which P.A. LANDERS, INC. worked. Shortly after the company built its asphalt production plant in Plymouth in 1995, LANDERS, President of the company, ordered that a manual override device be installed in the plant’s computer control room. Additionally, at the direction of LANDERS and KEELAN, company employees used that override device to generate fake asphalt weight tickets, which did not correspond to any actual asphalt load, as well as inflated asphalt weight tickets, which overstated the amount of asphalt contained in an actual load.
PRESTON A. LANDERS, GREGORY R. KEELAN, and P.A. LANDERS, INC. have each been suspended by the United States Department of Transportation from participation in contracts on government-funded public works projects, and further administrative debarment proceedings are pending.
The case was prosecuted by the New England Regional Office of the U.S. Department of Transportation, Office of Inspector General and the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation Boston Field Office, with assistance from the Massachusetts Highway Department. The U.S. Attorney’s Office would like to especially thank the Massachusetts Highway Department for its assistance and support during this investigation. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorney George B. Henderson, II in Sullivan’s Civil Division and Assistant U.S. Attorney George W. Vien in Sullivan’s Public Corruption and Special Prosecutions Unit.
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