“眨眼点头”并不能给高科技政府贿赂改名

Court filings revealed that several years before the scheme began, a computer virus had infected the entire BIS network. Because the computers had to be taken offline to stop the infection, the entirety of the work produced by the licensing officers, agents, policy staff and intelligence analysts up to that point was sitting on hard drives in a closet. However, they still needed access to their information. So, BIS began a data migration project with Conrad as the lead.

法庭文件显示，在该阴谋开始前几年，一种计算机病毒已经感染了整个BIS网络。由于必须将计算机脱机以阻止感染，因此到目前为止，发证官员、代理、政策工作人员和情报分析人员所做的全部工作都放在壁橱中的硬盘上。然而，他们仍然需要获得这些信息。因此，BIS开始了一个由康拉德牵头的数据迁移项目。

The project began to help reconstruct the old work with funds from a Department of the Navy contract “vehicle” (an umbrella contract in which multiple projects can be funded).

该项目开始用海军部合同“vehicle”（一个可以资助多个项目的总括合同）的资金帮助重建旧工程。

Conrad was closely managing every aspect of the process. He was the contact with line staff who requested documents. He authored the mitigation process specifications. He even worked to ensure a specific company was awarded the contract — Bedford’s Images Inc. (BI), owned by James Bedford. Conrad also had an in. His brother’s father-in-law, Glenn Bertrand, was Bedford’s business partner. Bedford also owned Team America Inc., and Bertrand had a stake in it too.

康拉德密切管理过程的各个方面。他是要求提供文件的一线工作人员的联系人。他编写了缓解过程规范。他甚至努力确保一家特定的公司获得合同——詹姆斯·贝德福德旗下的贝德福德影像公司（BI）。康拉德也有关联。他哥哥的岳父格伦·伯特兰是贝德福德的商业伙伴。贝德福德还拥有美国队，伯特兰也持有股份。

Conrad worked secretly to deviate from the standard government contracting process by defining what work would be done. According to the government’s brief on appeal, Conrad told others about BI’s capabilities — to the exclusion of all other qualified contractors. “He was very emphatic that Bedford’s Images could perform [the work] and that’s who he wanted to do the work,” one colleague testified at the eventual trial. Conrad didn’t even conduct a basic market analysis to identify any other possible vendors.

康拉德通过定义要做的工作，秘密地偏离了标准的政府合同流程。根据政府的上诉简报，康拉德向其他人介绍了BI的能力，排除了所有其他合格承包商。一位同事在*终的审判中作证说：“他非常强调贝德福德可以完成（这项工作），而这正是他想做的工作。”。康拉德甚至没有进行基本的市场分析，以确定任何其他可能的供应商。

Following Conrad’s secret efforts to direct the ultimate contract to BI, he began his quest to quietly profit from his efforts.

在康拉德秘密努力将*终合同交给BI之后，他开始悄悄地从自己的努力中获利。

Bedford later testified that Conrad appeared suddenly one day at the Team America offices and met in private to ask Team America for a “loan” of $180,000. After being told they didn’t have the money for a transaction that size, Conrad then launched into a bid to “re-cast” the loan idea as a “investment loan” or just a straight capital investment into the Chicken Place Express restaurants.

贝德福德后来作证说，有一天，康拉德突然出现在美国队办公室，私下会面，要求从美国队“贷款”18万美元。在被告知他们没有足够的资金进行如此规模的交易后，康拉德随后发起了一项投标，将贷款想法“重新铸造”为“投资贷款”，或者只是对鸡肉坊快捷餐厅的直接资本投资。

They never discussed or used the word “bribe.” Bedford later testified that he immediately recognized Conrad’s request as a bribe, testifying that it was “a classic wink and nod” — referring to an unspoken mutual understanding. If Bedford paid the money, Conrad would ensure the BIS work would continue to go to BI. No agreements, investment notes, promissory agreements or other written loan documentation of any kind were ever prepared or executed. They never even discussed interest rates, repayment terms, ownership structure, or any of the other regular parameters a legitimate loan or investment would require. But Bedford agreed to pay Conrad the money. They both knew the “loan” was a bribe.

他们从未讨论或使用“贿赂”一词，贝德福德后来作证说，他立即将康拉德的请求视为贿赂，并证明这是“典型的眨眼和点头”——指的是一种默契。如果贝德福德支付这笔钱，康拉德将确保BIS的工作将继续交给BI。未编制或签署任何协议、投资票据、本票协议或其他任何类型的书面贷款文件。他们甚至从未讨论过利率、还款条件、所有权结构或合法贷款或投资所需的任何其他常规参数。但是贝德福德同意付给康拉德这笔钱。他们都知道“贷款”是贿赂。

The real scam began when BIS awarded BI the subcontract on the data migration project. Conrad, in authoring and managing the work-flow process, told BIS employees to identify those documents they wanted migrated, place them in a specially designated location and then he’d copy the documents onto hard drives or laptops and personally deliver them to BI’s offices.

真正的骗局始于BIS授予BI数据迁移项目的分包合同。在创作和管理工作流程时，康拉德告诉BIS员工识别他们想要迁移的文件，将其放置在专门指定的位置，然后他将文件复制到硬盘或笔记本电脑上，并亲自将其交付给BI的办公室。

However, BI didn’t have offices or a staff. Bedford would bring in family members and friends to do the work. Prosecutors said at trial that almost everyone at Bedford’s Images didn’t have computer experience or formal training. In fact, the only true cost to set up the work was an off-the-shelf PDF conversion software from Office Depot that cost $209. Conrad, as project manager, was responsible for monitoring BI’s work product. He didn’t.

然而，BI没有办公室或员工。贝德福德将邀请家人和朋友来做这项工作。检察官在庭审中表示，贝德福德公司的几乎所有人都没有计算机经验或正规培训。事实上，建立这项工作的唯一真正成本是Office Depot提供的现成PDF转换软件，该软件的成本为209美元。作为项目经理，康拉德负责监控BI的工作成果。他没有。

Prosecutors wrote in court papers, “Throughout the project, BIS employees complained nearly every day about missing files, corrupted data, poor formatting, invalid optical character recognition, or the fact that the migrated files no longer contained the formulas or functionality … rendering them useless. These complaints were communicated to [Conrad] over and over again, and yet he never sought to stop [BI’s] continued involvement … and the quality of the work never improved.” It was a certain recipe for disaster.

检察官在法庭文件中写道，“在整个项目过程中，BIS员工几乎每天都在抱怨文件丢失、数据损坏、格式不良、光学字符识别无效，或者迁移的文件不再包含公式或功能……使其变得无用。这些投诉被反复传达给[康拉德]，但他从未试图阻止[BI的]继续参与……工作质量从未提高。”这是造成灾难的必然原因。

The agents who came calling on Conrad in October 2011 thought that this was probably just a simple administrative or ethics violation case. But that all changed during the second interview in 2013.

2011年10月拜访康拉德的代理人认为，这可能只是一起简单的行政或道德违规案件。但在2013年的第二次采访中，一切都发生了变化。

Once the contract award to BI began, Conrad concocted a fake invoice and gave it to Bedford. The invoice — purportedly from his Chicken Place Express restaurant — billed Team America Inc. for things like “support services,” “engineering services” or similarly vague phrases. Conrad, who knew Bedford and Team America never did these for Chicken Place Express, sought to obtain the payments he wanted. Over nine months, Bedford and his company paid Conrad a total of $208,000.

一旦BI开始获得合同，康拉德伪造了一张假发票，交给了贝德福德。据称，这张发票来自他的Chicken Place Express餐厅，它为美国队股份有限公司开具了“支持服务”、“工程服务”或类似模糊短语的账单。康拉德知道贝德福德和美国队从来没有为鸡广场快递做过这些，他试图获得他想要的付款。在九个月的时间里，贝德福德和他的公司向康拉德支付了总计208000美元。

Bedford also provided Conrad with “in-kind” services of value. Over the spring and summer of 2011, Team America provided more than $15,000 worth of renovation services at Conrad’s home. These included free labor and supplies to upgrade his basement, including plumbing, electrical work and drywalling.

贝德福德还为康拉德提供了有价值的“实物”服务。2011年春夏，美国队为康拉德的家提供了价值15000多美元的装修服务。其中包括免费劳动力和用品，以升级他的地下室，包括水管，电气工程和干墙。

The agents who came calling on Conrad in October 2011 thought that this was probably just a simple administrative or ethics violation case, but they hadn’t yet had the benefit of the thousands of pages of bank records, invoices and communications between Conrad and Bedford.

2011年10月拜访康拉德的代理人认为，这可能只是一起简单的行政或道德违规案件，但他们还没有从康拉德和贝德福德之间数千页的银行记录、发票和通信中获益。

In 2011, the investigators asked Conrad about his “outside relationship” with Team America, and he replied, “I don’t really have one with Team America other than, hey, they do work and I send them files that they do for us and I say okay here’s the files and do whatever for Team America. So I don’t really have one specifically with [them].” Conrad failed to mention the payments, free labor and supplies that Bedford and his companies had been providing in exchange for the continued contract work.

2011年，调查人员向康拉德询问了他与美国队的“外部关系”，他回答说：“我与美国队没有真正的关系，除了，嘿，他们确实工作，我给他们发送他们为我们做的文件，我说好的，这是文件，为美国队做任何事情。所以我没有专门与[他们]有关系。”康拉德没有提及贝德福德和他的公司为继续合同工作而提供的付款、免费劳动力和用品。

But that all changed during the second interview in 2013. Armed with considerable documentary evidence, the agents confronted Conrad about his lies, half-truths and omissions following the execution of search warrants at his residence, Bedford’s residence and at the offices of Bedford’s company.

但在2013年的第二次采访中，一切都发生了变化。在康拉德的住所、贝德福德的住所和贝德福德公司的办公室执行搜查令后，特工们掌握了大量的文件证据，就他的谎言、半真半假和疏漏与康拉德对质。

Conrad finally admitted that he’d steered the contract to Bedford, he’d received payments from Bedford’s company and he’d created false invoices to cover up those payments. However, he was adamant that he never took a bribe. Conrad characterized the payments as  a true loan, but he never provided any documents or evidence to support his claim. Bedford reaffirmed Conrad’s “loan” claim and then kept mum.

康拉德*终承认，他将合同转交给了贝德福德，他收到了贝德福德公司的付款，并伪造了虚假发票来掩盖这些付款。然而，他坚称自己从未受贿。康拉德称这些付款是真实的贷款，但他从未提供任何文件或证据来支持他的主张。贝德福德重申了康拉德的“贷款”要求，然后保持沉默。

After multiple attorneys, negotiations and more evidence collection, a federal grand jury indicted Conrad in August 2016. Bedford, faced with his own mounting problems, was “charged by information” and later pleaded guilty for his role in the scheme. Less than a year later, Conrad was convicted after a 3½-day trial on June 15, 2017. The jury took less than three hours to deliver the guilty verdict. He was sentenced to 48 months of confinement in federal prison and ordered to repay more than $1 million in restitution.

经过多名律师、谈判和更多证据收集，联邦大陪审团于2016年8月起诉了康拉德。贝德福德自己也面临着越来越多的问题，他被“信息指控”，后来对自己在该阴谋中的作用表示认罪。不到一年后，康拉德在2017年6月15日经过3天半的审判后被判有罪。陪审团用了不到三个小时作出有罪判决。他被判处48个月的联邦监狱监禁，并被责令偿还100多万美元的赔偿金。

Conrad appealed the verdict to the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which issued its ruling in late January 2019. The court denied all three of Conrad’s arguments on appeal and stated that there was substantial evidence for the jury to infer his guilt by his actions. The court affirmed his conviction and cited the volume of testimony and evidence admitted at trial, which included bank records, invoices, tax returns, contracting documents, work orders, checks, accounting records, public records, audio recordings of interviews and emails.

康拉德向第四巡回上诉法院上诉，该法院于2019年1月下旬作出裁决。法院驳回了康拉德上诉的所有三个论点，并表示陪审团有充分证据可以通过他的行为推断他的罪行。法庭确认了对他的定罪，并引用了审判中承认的大量证词和证据，其中包括银行记录、发票、纳税申报单、合同文件、工作指令、支票、会计记录、公共记录、采访录音和电子邮件。

This case has a plethora of lessons for public agency auditors, inspectors general and contracting personnel. It has even more for private-sector compliance officers, management and attorneys. But for this article, the lessons of persistence, analysis and details are most applicable.

本案为公共机构审计员、总检查员和承包人员提供了大量的经验教训。对于私营部门的合规官员、管理层和律师来说，它的作用更大。但对于本文来说，持久性、分析和细节方面的经验教训*为适用。

The investigators in this case were dogged. They examined what they first believed to be a single administrative violation, but they eventually uncovered a much more significant one. They didn’t know it at the time, but it would become a major case for the Department of Commerce Office of Inspector General. Their professionalism and persistence paid off. The initial tipster made a clear allegation, but they didn’t document it or provide any proof or other leads. The tip was also dated prior to the main payments. However, sometimes, cases actually get better with time.

本案的调查人员坚持不懈。他们调查了他们*初认为是一项单一的行政违规行为，但*终发现了一项更为重要的违规行为。当时他们并不知道，但这将成为商务部监察长办公室的一个重大案件。他们的专业精神和毅力得到了回报。*初的告密者提出了明确的指控，但他们没有记录在案，也没有提供任何证据或其他线索。告密的日期也早于主要付款。然而，有时情况实际上会随着时间的推移而好转。

Thoroughly organizing and analyzing the volume of evidence, especially in the digital age, is critical. Court records show that the three search warrants executed at Conrad’s residence, Bedford’s home and his company, yielded more than 7,000 physical pages of paper and 40 electronic devices, including laptops, hard drives, servers and cell phones.

彻底组织和分析证据量，尤其是在数字时代，至关重要。法庭记录显示，在康拉德的住所、贝德福德的家和他的公司执行的三份搜查令中，发现了7000多页纸张和40台电子设备，包括笔记本电脑、硬盘、服务器和手机。

During the course of the entire case, investigators gathered more than 3.6 terabytes of data. Conrad’s steadfast denials and obfuscating complicated investigators reviewing, searching and understanding the data. Investigators must work to effectively catalogue, organize and use available technologies. Paper file folders for casework is really no longer an effective option. If the main suspect is an IT professional, it also makes sense to plan for a much bigger volume of electronic data than average users.

在整个案件过程中，调查人员收集了超过3.6TB的数据。康拉德坚定地否认和混淆了复杂的调查人员审查、搜索和理解数据。调查人员必须努力有效地对现有技术进行编目、组织和使用。用于案例处理的纸质文件夹已不再是一种有效的选择。如果主要嫌疑人是IT专业人士，那么计划比普通用户更大的电子数据量也是有道理的。

Attention to the details is still critical. Sifting through volumes of data to help understand and corroborate (or, in this case, refute) a story can be difficult. But identifying the red flags that make a fraudster conspicuous are vital. That’s why CFEs are usually looking for those deviations from the norm. The details and understanding of a document or message, its place in the investigation, the time and date it was written and who wrote it (and who received it) are all important to help put the pieces of the puzzle together.

关注细节仍然至关重要。筛选大量数据以帮助理解和证实（或在本例中反驳）一个故事可能很困难。但是，识别使舞弊者引人注目的危险信号至关重要。这就是为什么CFE通常会寻找这些偏离标准的情况。文件或消息的细节和理解、其在调查中的位置、编写的时间和日期以及谁编写（以及谁收到）都有助于将谜团拼凑在一起。

Any public agency — or any organization — is susceptible to these types of schemes. Rogue employees with a sense of entitlement or with mounting financial pressures, or even those who are just greedy, can take advantage of their positions of trust to steer information, money and resources to their preferred vendors.

任何公共机构——或任何组织——都容易受到这类阴谋的影响。有权利感或财务压力越来越大的流氓员工，甚至那些贪婪的员工，可以利用他们的信任地位，将信息、金钱和资源引导到他们喜欢的供应商。

Likewise, vendors without significant controls over their business practices can put themselves and their companies at increased risk if they don’t have a culture of compliance and ethics. The risks can be catastrophic, including reputational damage, suspension or debarment from obtaining future contracts, termination of existing work and financial penalties — not to mention prison time.

同样，如果没有合规和道德文化，对其业务实践没有重大控制的供应商可能会使自己和公司面临更大的风险。风险可能是灾难性的，包括声誉受损、暂停或禁止获得未来合同、终止现有工作和经济处罚——更不用说监禁了。