Indictments handed down in bid-rigging investigation

A bid-rigging scandal within the Prince William Office of Information Technology that was brought to light weeks ago has spanned five years, involved more than $8 million — some of which could be hidden in India — and resulted in 153 criminal charges against four individuals.

One of the men indicted was a high-ranking county employee and two others formerly worked for Prince William’s OIT, police said.

In addition, three other county workers have faced disciplinary measures based on findings from the investigation, but have not yet been charged with crimes.

The indictments against the four came Monday and were announced at a Tuesday press conference held by county executive Craig Gerhart, police chief Charlie Deane and Commonwealth’s Attorney Paul Ebert.

The charges range from racketeering to money laundering.

A news release distributed at the press conference summarized the bid-rigging scandal as involving “several companies that applied and were approved to do contract work for the county government. The investigation has uncovered evidence that [the accused] falsified bids and created shell companies in order to be awarded county projects.”

Only one of the indicted worked for the county at the time of investigation — Maneesh Gupta, former OIT systems division chief and second-in-charge of the department.

Gupta, 45, was fired weeks ago, but was indicted Monday on one count each of racketeering and money laundering, along with a dozen other felony charges.

Other related indictments were brought against 50-year-old John Patrick Roessler — a former county employee — and his 42-year-old brother, Vernon Andrew Roessler, from Woodbridge and Dale City, respectively.

The two were indicted on dozens of counts including bid rigging, racketeering and money laundering.

Also indicted was former county employee Richard Todd Billingsley, 41, of Springfield, on one charge each of racketeering, obtaining money by false pretenses and money laundering.

Two other OIT employees — John Lim, systems developer, and Davis Ampofo, systems development manager — have been fired in the fallout from the investigation, but not charged. Gerhart, Ebert and Deane declined to cite the official reasons for the firings.

Finally, one other OIT worker, Massoud Nourbakhsh, the chief of the information office and lead department official, has not been charged with any crime but is in discussions with Gerhart about leaving his job, according to press conference statements. More charges could be forthcoming and other parties named as the investigation continues, Ebert said.

County officials say the investigation points to a complex bid-rigging scheme. Police and prosecutors allege the involved parties set up several shell companies that would then bid against each other for various county contracts.

In the end, it didn’t matter which company won the bid — all the firms were fake and all the money would go toward the same shell game, police said. Investigators believe some of the money has been siphoned to sources in India, and county officials are trying to recoup as much as possible. It was unclear why officials think the money may have gone to India.

Gerhart, Deane and Ebert declined to release the names under which the shell companies operated. They also described the bid-rigging as a professional operation that was so complex as to avoid detection for five years.

The investigation began with a tip from a low-level county employee, police said.

“This was done pretty professionally,” Ebert said. “It would have been very hard to detect this.”

So far, $8 million has been identified as “under investigation,” Ebert continued, with “as much as half that could be [lost to] bid-rigging.”

Another $500,000 in federal grant money that was intended for the police department over the past five years might have been stolen by bid-riggers, also. The Federal Bureau of Investigation has been called to look into that aspect.

Gerhart, in direct response to the crimes, said he has established an Internal Control Council comprised of finance department staff and other county personnel who will look at ways of keeping the same types of crimes from occurring in the future. The council members will report directly to his office, he said.

At the same time, Gerhart stressed that no system of accountability is foolproof and “all of these efforts will not fully prevent someone” who is intent on committing a crime from doing so.
The county has an internal audit system, but it failed to pick up problems in the OIT office.

“An internal audit function can only provide reasonable assurance that internal controls are followed. In the case of the Office of Information Technology (OIT), these controls were overridden at the highest level of OIT management, making it very difficult to detect,” said Prince William County Audit Services Director Robin Howard.

Corey Stewart, chairman of the Board of County Supervisors, was not present at the press conference but reacted with criticism in an interview an hour later.

“Frankly, the board is going to want answers from the chief executive officer about how this was allowed to go on for so long,” Stewart said. “Clearly, there were no strong controls in place, otherwise they would not have been able to evade for so long. This is not some little thing … this is millions of taxpayer dollars involved.”

Stewart also criticized Gerhart for not keeping the board fully informed of the investigation’s progress or giving sufficient notice of the press conference, which was held at the police department’s western branch in Manassas.

“I am upset that the chief executive officer has kept us in the dark. We’re learning more from the press than from the county staff,” he said, “and I feel blindsided by the press conference.”

At the Board of Supervisors meeting at 2 p.m. Tuesday, Stewart added an item to the closed session agenda that he described as a personnel issue related to the OIT investigation.

The four men indicted are being held without bond Tuesday at the Prince William-Manassas Regional Jail.

Staff writer Cheryl Chumley can be reached at 703-670-1907.