Press Release
Engineering Firm Owner Convicted of Bribing Washington Township Officials
For Immediate Release
U.S. Attorney's Office, Eastern District of Michigan
An owner of an engineering firm, Fazullah Khan, 58, of Troy, was convicted today by a jury on all four counts of bribery with which he was charged, United States Attorney Matthew Schneider announced.
Schneider was joined in the announcement by Timothy R. Slater, Special Agent in Charge of the Detroit Field Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
The five day trial was conducted before United States District Judge Robert H. Cleland in Port Huron, Michigan. The jury deliberated approximately an hour and a half before returning their guilty verdicts.
According to evidence presented at trial, in 2014, Khan bribed one public official of Washington Township with $10,000 in cash in return for a million dollar per year engineering contract, and another public official there with a secret financial interest in a property development deal worth hundreds of thousands of dollars for his assistance with the contract and efforts to get water and sewer lines to Khan’s property. Unbeknownst to Khan, both township officials that he was trying to bribe were working with the FBI.
“Our office is continuing our battle against bribery and corruption every day, and the jury’s guilty verdict shows the people of Michigan won’t stand for this corruption, either,” United States Attorney Matthew Schneider stated.
This case is part of the government’s wide-ranging corruption investigation centered in Macomb County, Michigan. The investigation of this case was conducted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys R. Michael Bullotta and Steven Cares.
The conviction of Khan brings to 22 the number of individuals convicted in this corruption investigation.
Each of the four bribery charges carries a maximum sentence of 10 years’ imprisonment and a fine of $250,000 Khan is scheduled to be sentenced by Judge Cleland on November 28, 2019
Updated July 12, 2019
Topic
Public Corruption
Component