Unlock the Publisher’s Digest for free
Roula Khalaf, editor of the FT, selects her favorite stories in this weekly newsletter.
Two former middlemen accused of bribing Saudi Arabian officials to secure lucrative defense contracts with the UK government have been acquitted of corruption by a London jury in a long-running investigation, with one found guilty of misconduct conducted in a public office.
Jeffrey Cook, 67, former managing director of GPT Special Project Management, and John Mason, 81, an accountant and co-owner of some of GPT’s subcontracting companies, were acquitted at Southwark Crown Court of corruption between January 2007 and December 2012 .in relation to alleged £10 million in bribes paid to Saudi officials to secure business.
But Cook, a former employee of Britain’s Ministry of Defence, was found guilty on Wednesday of one charge of misconduct in a public office between September 2004 and November 2008. He was accused of receiving around £70,000 in bribes in the form of cash and cars. while he was an employee of the Ministry of Defense.
The split verdict is a blow to the U.K.’s Serious Fraud Office, which prosecuted the case, ending the longest criminal investigation on its books and an investigation that was fraught with diplomatic complications. The SFO opened the case in 2012 after two GPT whistleblowers raised concerns about payments by the company.
The alleged crimes concerned payments made to Saudi officials to secure £1.6 billion contracts between the Ministry of Defense and the Saudi Arabian National Guard (SANG) for the installation and operation of Saudi military communications networks, provided by GPT Special Project Management, a company now a defunct unit of Airbus. The work was known as the SANGCOM project.
Cook will be sentenced in April. The maximum sentence is unlimited.