Javier Alejandro Aguilar Morales ("Aguilar"), a Mexican citizen and resident of Houston, Texas, worked as an oil and commodities trader for Vitol Inc., a company, that along with its affiliates, formed one of the largest oil distributors and energy commodities traders in the world.
Petroleos Mexicanos ("PEMEX") was the state-owned oil company of Mexico. PEMEX Procurement International, Inc. ("PPI") was a wholly-owned and controlled subsidiary of PEMEX headquartered in the U.S. that handled the acquisition of goods and services on behalf of PEMEX.
According to the documents in this case, between August 2017 and July 2020, Aguilar and others engaged in a scheme to pay bribes to two procurement managers at PPI, Gonzalo Guzman Manzanilla (“Guzman”) and Carlos Espinosa Barba (“Espinosa”), in order to obtain confidential, inside information to assist Vitol in winning business from PPI, including a contract to supply ethane to PEMEX through PPI. In all, Aguilar and his co-conspirators paid at least seven bribes totaling approximately $371,466 to Guzman at least eight bribes totaling approximately $255,895 to Espinosa.
On August 3, 2023, the DOJ filed a five count indictment in the Southern District of Texas against Aguilar alleging a conspiracy to violate the antibribery provisions of the FCPA, direct violation of the antibribery provisions of the FCPA, as well as Travel Act and money laundering violations.
A trial is currently scheduled to begin on April 15, 2024.
This case is ongoing.
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