Photo courtesy of Pro Honduras Network. The picture is a depiction of Aldo Marchena, a co-conspirator and collaborating government witness.
What happened today
- Aldo Nestor Marchena finished testifying
- A money laundering and fraud investigator for Homeland Security testifies
- Luis Berkman begins on the stand
What to expect tomorrow
- Luis Berkman will continue on the stand
- Prosecutors told the court that once Berkman is finished testifying, they will call Juan Ramón Molina, the former Honduran public official and representative of the Security Tax Fund, allow the jury to read approximately 12 emails then call Agent Russell to testify. The government is expected to rest its case on Wednesday or Thursday.
Key details that surfaced
Aldo Nestor Marchena
- Marchena moved money to Honduran authorities for the bribes. He testified that in total, the defendant Zaglin sent him approximately $2.5 million to make these payments.
- Prosecutors displayed emails, wire transfer receipts and account information showing how Achieve sent bribes payments to accounts in the name of companies such as DC Investment Ltd registered in Belize and Sky Honduras, both of which were controlled by Honduran official Francisco Cosenza, the Executive Director of the Security Tax Fund. Marchena testified that he assisted Cosenza in setting up his U.S. accounts, which Cosenza hoped to use to purchase real estate in the U.S.
- Another contract between Atlanco and the Security Tax Fund was displayed in court. The second contract was signed on October 26th, 2015 and perfectly coincides with emails between Marchena and Zaglin referring to invoices used as a cover for bribe payments.
Agent David Keyes
- Keyes is an investigator assigned to the money laundering and fraud office in the Financial Crimes Task Force in Homeland Security. He testified about documents and audio files that he reviewed for authenticity including a series of wire transfers and invoices (that perfectly corresponded to one another) between Atlanco and Achieve.
Co-conspirator Luis Berkman
- Berkman, the father of Bryan Berkman who testified on day two and three, worked at Atlanco starting in 2005 to April 2020. He helped pay the bribes to Honduran officials to win contracts. He received a 2% commission for arranging the bribes and the contracts with Honduran officials.
- Prosecutors displayed emails and asked Berkman about the challenges of receiving payments from the Honduran Security Tax Fund. Between November 2015 and March 2016, a series of emails between the defendant, Berkman, Cosenza, and others, showed how Atlanco was trying to guarantee and hurry the payment from Honduran authorities. Part of the concern was that Atlanco was having financial difficulties because the Guatemala government had not paid them for a uniform contract.
- Berkman testified that Atlanco’s “broker” Jaime Nativí in Honduras who was facilitating the bribes to some Honduran authorities would rush Atlanco to send the bribe payments. Berkman referred to Nativí speaking to the former Minister of Security Julian Pacheco or “the boss” who insisted that the bribe payments be made quickly. When there were defects with uniforms and boots purchased from Atlanco for two special police forces, the TIGRES and the COBRAS for example, Atlanco sent a bribe payment to Cosenza to help to smooth over the concerns with the defects. In another instance, bribe payments were paid in cash to a Honduran official that traveled to the U.S. in order to smooth over any concerns with the defective equipment.
- Part of Berkman’s testimony also may have implicated the former President of Honduras Juan Orlando Hernández in TASA contracts related to the bribes. In an email to defendant Zaglin and Brian Dehart, two Atlanco representatives, Berkman writes: “I just talked to Francisco [Cosenza] and the Security Commission [responsible for the Security Tax fund] did not get together because the president is out of the country and his orders are not to sign anything until he is back in the country. I asked if everything is ok and he says that as soon as the commission gets back together, it [the contract with Atlanco] will be signed.”
- In a wire transfer receipt displayed to the court, Berkman indicated that at the insistence of Atlanco and Cosenza, the President of the Central Bank of Honduras was requesting $1,423,943.74 to be wired as payment to Atlanco. In order to speed up the process and “not go through the normal bureaucratic channels,” Cosenza contacted someone in the he knew to sign off on the wire. The wire was then signed by Juan Ramón Molina, the COHEP appointed representative to the Security Tax fund commission.
- In 2016, when Atlanco went to pay a bribe due to Cosenza, Berkman testified that Francisco was going to travel to Miami because with the money he was given, he wanted to buy a Rolex watch. When the watch he wanted was not available, Cosenza asked for cash and agreed to travel to Florida to receive it.