Team Herald
PANJIM: A Special Court on Tuesday issued summons to James McClung, a former top executive of US firm Louis Berger, who had confessed to a court in USA of paying a bribe to Goa ministers to win a consultancy contract for a water augmentation and sewerage line system project to be implemented with funding by the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
Principal Sessions Judge North Goa Irshad Agha ordered McClung to appear before the court on September 17, 2018 at 10am to answer the charges against him.
The Judge also ordered that the notice be served to McClung through Goa Crime Branch’s Police Inspector Dattaguru Sawant who is investigating the multi-crore bribery case.
“It has been shown to my satisfaction that McClung who is a resident of Washington DC has absconded or is concealing himself to avoid the service of the summons,” the judge said while pronouncing the order.
McClung, along with Richard Hirsch (61) of the UAE, both former employees of Louis Berger had pleaded guilty to the bribery charges before a court in the US. They had also accepted to have paid USD 976,630 for a Goa project.
In a statement, Louis Berger said that it self-identified, self-investigated and voluntarily self-reported to the US Department of Justice the improper payments made in 2010 and prior by former manager McClung who was separated from the company following the results of early investigations.
It added that as a US company, the voluntary disclosure of these issues was first to the US Department of Justice and that the company fully supported their investigations. The company always fully cooperated with Indian authorities in their investigations and continues to do so.
Crime Branch which is probing the case had arrested former PWD minister Churchill Alemao in September 2015, while former Chief Minister Digambar Kamat was given anticipatory bail.
Kamat and six others, including Alemao, were listed in the chargesheet. The Police had also named McClung, former India Vice-President of the company Satyakam Mohanty, head of (Japan International Cooperation Agency) JICA-aided project in Goa Anand Wachasunder, suspected Hawala dealer Raychand Soni and former Margao Municipal Council chairperson Arthur D’Silva.
