AZERGATE: U.S. businessman sentenced in oil bribery case

He was paying millions to father and son Aliyevs - senior leaders of the former Soviet republic. Next trail should be KAZAKHGATE.

American businessman and co-founder of upscale handbag maker Dooney & Bourke was sentenced on Tuesday to just over a year in prison for conspiring to defraud the United States in an Azerbaijan oil venture bribery case.

Frederic Bourke, 63, was found guilty by a Manhattan federal court jury in July of breaking the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and of making false statements.

Bourke was also ordered to pay a $1 million fine.

"It's still not entirely clear to me whether Mr. Bourke was a victim or a crook or a little bit of both," said U.S. District Judge Shira Scheindlin.

Bourke's lawyer, Harold Haddon, called the sentence "compassionate," but said he planned to appeal.

The charges against Bourke were made in 2005 in connection with an alleged conspiracy by another businessman, Czech national Viktor Kozeny, to bribe officials of Azerbaijan in a 1998 deal to buy a state-run oil company known as Socar.

Kozeny lives in the Bahamas and is fighting extradition.

During the month-long trial, the jury heard testimony from U.S. diplomat George Mitchell, President Barack Obama's envoy to the Middle East, that he had invested $200,000 in 1998 through his friend Bourke.

U.S. prosecutors accused Bourke of investing $8 million with Kozeny knowing that he was paying millions to senior leaders of the former Soviet republic. The government alleged Kozeny wanted to buy Socar and resell it.

Bourke, of Greenwich, Connecticut, denied knowledge of the bribes and accused Kozeny of stealing more than $180 million from him and other investors.

According to government witnesses, Kozeny wanted Mitchell in the deal to lend it more legitimacy.

In January 1999, Mitchell withdrew from involvement in the investment. He said in court that Bourke had told him he had suspicions that Kozeny was involved in a fraud.

REUTERS
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