Two Commercial Trash Haulers Sentenced for Bribing Baltimore City Landfill Employees |
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U.S. Attorney’s Office
District of Maryland
31 May 2016
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Baltimore, Maryland – U.S. District Judge Marvin J. Garbis sentenced Quentin Turgot Glenn, age 50, of Hanover, Maryland, who owned and operated Glenn Services, LLC, a trash hauling business, today to three years in prison followed by three years of supervised release for conspiracy and bribery in connection with a scheme in which commercial haulers paid Department of Public Works (DPW) employees cash in return for allowing the haulers to deposit trash at the Quarantine Road Landfill (Landfill) without paying the required disposal fees. Judge Garbis also ordered Glenn to pay restitution of $306,000.
Judge Garbis also sentenced Jessie Lee Wilson, Jr., age 41, of Baltimore, who was employed by Glenn Services as a truck driver, today to three years of probation, with the first year to be spent in community confinement, for the conspiracy and bribery.
The sentences were announced by United States Attorney for the District of Maryland Rod J. Rosenstein; Special Agent in Charge Kevin Perkins of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Baltimore Field Office; Robert H. Pearre, Jr., Inspector General, City of Baltimore Office of Inspector General; Special Agent in Charge Thomas Jankowski of the Internal Revenue Service - Criminal Investigation, Washington, D.C. Field Office; and Colonel William M. Pallozzi, Superintendent of the Maryland State Police.
The DPW’s Bureau of Solid Waste is responsible for managing Baltimore City’s waste management services, including overseeing citizen drop-off centers, such as the Northwest Transfer Station (NWTS) and the Landfill. Baltimore City’s waste management system generates revenue for the City by collecting and selling recyclable scrap metal dumped at the City’s trash collection facilities. The City contracts with private salvage companies to purchase and remove scrap metal from its trash collection facilities. The salvage companies regularly pick up the scrap metal and, based on predetermined prices per ton, the salvage companies pay the City for the value of the scrap metal.
Individuals or companies commercially hauling trash that have registered their vehicles with the City and obtained Landfill permits, as well as Baltimore City residents with larger loads, must deposit their trash in an open area located within the Landfill. Commercial haulers of trash that meet certain vehicle weight limitations must, in addition to purchasing a Landfill permit, pay a waste disposal fee of $67.50 per ton of trash deposited at the Landfill. DPW employees assigned as scale house operators weigh each truck as it enters the Landfill, which is recorded on a computerized point-of-sale system. The scale house operators reweigh each truck as it leaves the Landfill.
According to facts agreed upon by Wilson and Glenn, at times when Wilson drove a truckload of trash to the Landfill, neither he nor Glenn Services was charged a disposal fee. In return, Glenn Services paid scale house employees a bribe of $100 per truckload of trash. After a certain number of unpaid trips, Glenn would arrange for himself or one of his drivers, including Wilson, to meet a scale house operator to pay the balance of the cash bribes.
In a recorded phone conversation on January 23, 2015, Wilson explained to a scale house employee why Glenn Services had not yet paid bribes on dozens of trips to the Landfill. Wilson said he had tried to text the employee using coded language to arrange a meeting, and that he carried the bribery money around in his pocket for so long that he eventually tried to give it back to Glenn, but Glenn insisted that Wilson keep the money until the employee was ready to receive it.
In another recorded phone conversation with the employee on January 29, Wilson said he needed the “numbers for the dinner,” and the employee replied that Glenn Services still owed for 34 trips, or $3,400. In a subsequent call, Wilson confirmed that in addition to paying this amount, Glenn would also pay for the few times Glenn Services was actually charged for dumping (at the FBI’s direction).
On February 1, 2015, Wilson met the employee at a parking lot on Edmondson Avenue in Baltimore City and gave the employee $2,500 in cash. He said that Glenn would give her the rest later in the week, and complained about the times Glenn Services was actually charged a disposal fee, which was a “[c]ouple of them…was like 16, 1700 dollars.”
On April 21, 2015, in a series of phone calls and text messages, the employee told Wilson that Glenn owed for 39 trips since February 1, 2015, plus for five other trips, for a total of $4,400. Wilson arranged a meeting between the employee and Glenn.
On April 23 and 24, Glenn met with the employee, providing a total of $4,000 in cash for 40 trips to the Landfill. Also during the meetings, they agreed to deal directly with each other without going through Wilson or Tamara Washington, another DPW employee, and to try to meet more regularly every time Glenn’s drivers made 10 trips to the Landfill.
From July 1, 2014 to May 1, 2015, Wilson fraudulently gave and agreed to participate in giving DPW employees cash payments in lieu of paying waste disposal fees that totaled more than $5,000.
Former Baltimore City Department of Public Works (DPW) employees Tamara Oliver Washington, age 55, William Charles Nemec, Sr., age 56; and Michael Theodore Bennett, age 47, all of Baltimore, and Jarrod Terrell Hazelton, age 33, of Parkville, Maryland, a former employee at the Quarantine Road Landfill, previously pleaded guilty to their roles in the schemes. Nemec was sentenced to 78 months in prison and ordered to pay restitution of $6 million. Bennett was sentenced to 46 months in prison and ordered to pay restitution of $400,000. Washington and Hazelton await sentencing.
Five other commercial trash haulers have also pleaded guilty, and a sixth trash hauler was convicted of conspiracy and two counts of bribery after a five day trial in November 2015. Judge Garbis sentenced two commercial haulers for their participation in the bribery scheme: Adam Williams, Jr., age 52, of Randallstown, to one year in prison followed by two years of community confinement with work release; and Larry Lowry, age 61, of Orchard Beach, Maryland, to 30 months in prison. Judge Garbis also entered an order that Williams pay restitution of $900,000, and Lowry pay restitution of $180,000.
United States Attorney Rod J. Rosenstein praised the FBI, IRS-CI, Baltimore Office of Inspector General, and Maryland State Police for their work in the investigation. Mr. Rosenstein thanked Assistant United States Attorneys Martin J. Clarke and Leo J. Wise, who prosecuted the case.