Immucor Inc. is a Georgia corporation headquartered in Norcross, Georgia. At all relevant times, its stock was registered with the Commission under Section 12(g) of the Exchange Act and was quoted on the NASDAQ market under the symbol BLUD. Thus, Immucor was an issuer pursuant to the FCPA. Immucor is a medical equipment company specializing in the manufacture and marketing of products used in the pre-transfusion diagnostics of human blood. Among other things, the company develops, manufactures, and sells products used by hospital blood banks, clinical laboratories, and blood donor centers to detect and identify various properties of human blood prior to patient transfusion.
Gioacchino De Chirico was an Italian citizen and legal resident of Georgia and was, at all relevant times, President and Chief Operating Officer of Immucor.
In or about February 2004, Immucor Italia, acting through a local sales agent, offered to the director of Milan, Italy's, Nirguarda Hospital’s blood bank (“the hospital director”), and the hospital director accepted, a payment of €13,500 (or approximately $16,119 USD) for the purpose of influencing his commercial decisions for the benefit of Immucor, including, but not limited to the hospital director’s upcoming decision on whether to renew his hospital’s contract for Galileo-related blood testing supplies which was due to expire in January 2005. To arrange payment of this amount to the hospital director, the local sales agent submitted a payment request to Immucor describing the €13,500 as the hospital director’s overdue compensation for the October 2003 conference that had been approved by De Chirico.
On September 27, 2007, the SEC filed an administrative cease and desist proceeding against Immucor and De Chirico. Without admitting or denying the allegations in the order, Immucor and De Chirico consented to the entry of the cease and desist order.
In a separate related matter, on September 28, 2007, the SEC filed a civil complaint in the Northern District of Georgia against De Chirico alleging violations of the books & records and internal controls provisions of the FCPA as well as aiding and abetting violations of the books & records and internal controls provisions of the FCPA. Around the same date, De Chirico consented to the entry of final judgment without admitting or denying the allegations in the complaint, and on Oct 2, 2007, the court entered final judgment and ordered De Chirico to pay a fine of $30,000.
