Two Florida men were charged by the Justice Department for orchestrating a bribery and major fraud conspiracy in the construction of the Army’s Hawaii-Pacific Innovation Campus in Honolulu. (Gustavo Castillo/U.S. Air Force)
FORT SHAFTER, Hawaii — The Justice Department has charged a pair of Florida men with bribing an Army employee to steer contracts to favored companies in the construction of the Army’s Hawaii-Pacific Innovation Campus in Honolulu.
Leonard Pick, 62, of Palm Beach Shores, and Brian Kent, 59, of Tampa, were arrested May 20 and accused of “orchestrating a bribery and major fraud conspiracy that corrupted the competitive procurement process” for the innovation lab in 2021-22, the department said in a news release that day.
The two men were indicted May 14 in U.S. District Court of Hawaii. The indictment remained sealed until their arrest. Pick and Kent are scheduled to be arraigned on June 3.
Defendants are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
They are both charged with one count of conspiracy to commit bribery and major fraud against the United States, one count of bribery, one count of major fraud against the U.S. and one count of wire fraud.
Kent is also charged with a second count of major fraud.
Maximum penalties for the charges range from 10 to 20 years in prison and fines of $250,000 to $1 million.
The indictment alleges that between January 2021 and October 2022, Pick and Kent fraudulently inflated government contracting costs to include the bribe payments to the Army employee, referred to only as “coconspirator 1.”
In exchange for the bribes, the employee would direct contracts to entities chosen by Pick or Kent, according to the government news release.
The DOJ also alleges the two also conspired to bribe the employee with what would have amounted to roughly $1.25 million over a five-year period.
In addition, the indictment alleges Kent defrauded the government by inflating contract costs by about $680,000 that went to his personal consulting business.
During most of the period outlined, Pick and Kent were employees of an Indiana-based company that “provided technology assessment and other services” to the Pentagon, according to the indictment, which does not identify the firm.
The indictments arose from “ongoing federal investigations into fraud and collusion in the defense contracting industry in Hawaii,” the DOJ news release said.
The Army employee was a “civilian Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance Strategic Capabilities Officer” working for U.S. Army Pacific, according to the indictment.
U.S. Army Pacific, headquartered at Fort Shafter in Honolulu, funded the development of the Hawaii-Pacific Innovation Campus in 2021-22, according to the indictment.
The Pentagon spent at least $100 million on the campus, the indictment states.
The project included construction and operation of the Pacific Innovation Center, also called the Innovation Lab, which was “intended to be a centralized location where defense industry vendors could showcase and test new technologies for potential adoption and procurement by the DOD,” the indictment states.
The lab was to be self-funding once fully operational, but Army Pacific provided Army funds to contractors and subcontractors for construction and initial operations, according to the indictment.
The Army employee’s responsibilities included “defining project requirements, monitoring work performed by prime contractors and subcontractors, signing off on contract deliverables, and approving purchase and travel requests,” the indictment states.
Army Pacific deferred comment Wednesday to the DOJ.
“Corruption in our military procurement processes harms honest companies seeking to compete fairly, steals from our taxpayers, and erodes faith in our government institutions,” Ken Sorenson, U.S. Attorney for the District of Hawaii, said in the DOJ release.
