Three senior executives at the voting machine company Smartmatic have been charged in a massive bribery scheme.
In a press release on Thursday, the Department of Justice confirmed that between 2015 and 2018, Roger Alejandro Pinate Martinez, 49, a Venezuelan citizen and resident of Boca Raton, Jorge Miguel Vasquez, 62, a U.S. citizen and resident of Davie, Florida, funnelled around $1 million in bribes to Juan Andres Donato Bautista, 60, the former Chairman of the Filipino Commission of Elections (COMELEC).
Four Men Charged in Philippine Bribery and Money Laundering Scheme
: https://t.co/kEDlpAV26q pic.twitter.com/3OKw5qZBEn
— Criminal Division (@DOJCrimDiv) August 8, 2024
The release explains:
The co-conspirators allegedly funded the bribes through a slush fund that was created by over-invoicing the cost per voting machine for the 2016 Philippine elections. To conceal and disguise the nature and purpose of the corrupt payments, the co-conspirators used coded language to refer to the slush fund and caused the creation of fraudulent contracts and sham loan agreements to justify transfers. The co-conspirators then allegedly laundered funds related to the bribery scheme through bank accounts located in Asia, Europe, and the United States, including in the Southern District of Florida.
Pinate and Vasquez are each charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and one substantive violation of the FCPA. Bautista, Pinate, Vasquez, and Elie Moreno, 44, a dual citizen of Venezuela and Israel, are each charged with one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering and three counts of international laundering of monetary instruments.
If convicted, Pinate and Vasquez each face a maximum penalty of five years in prison for the FCPA and conspiracy to violate the FCPA counts. Bautista, Pinate, Vasquez, and Moreno each face a maximum penalty of 20 years for each count of international laundering of monetary instruments and conspiracy to commit money laundering.
Last year, The Gateway Pundit reported that Filipino authorities had banned Smartmatic voting machines as a result of the allegations, ending 13 years of service in the Asian country.
While it was mainly Dominion Voting Systems that was embroiled in the fraud allegations that tainted the outcome of the 2020 presidential election, Smartmatic remains a major player in the U.S. election market. The company is current suing Fox News in a massive $2.7 billion lawsuit.
The company is particularly controversial for its ties to Nicolas Maduro’s communist regime in Venezuela. The country’s current vice-president, Delcy Rodriguez, was married to Smartmatic founder Alfredo Jose Anzola, before his death in an aviation accident back in 2008.
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