Former Bank Officer Admits Accepting Bribes in Connection with Financial Transactions
| U.S. Attorney’s Office May 31, 2013 |
CAMDEN, NJ—A former bank officer today admitted his role in soliciting and accepting bribes in connection with financial transactions, U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman announced.
Jose Dominguez, 46, of Newark, New Jersey, pleaded guilty to an information charging him with soliciting and accepting bribes as a bank officer in excess of $1,000. Dominguez solicited and accepted corrupt payments of $55,529, intending to be influenced and rewarded in connection with a bank transaction. He entered his guilty plea before U.S. District Judge Noel L. Hillman in Camden federal court.
According to documents filed in this case and statements made in court:
From January 1988 to February 2007, Dominguez was employed as a loan officer at Spencer Savings Bank in Elmwood Park, New Jersey. In 2003, Dominguez was contacted by a bank customer because the customer wanted to refinance some loans with Spencer Savings Bank and wanted to do so without paying significant prepayment penalty fees. Dominguez advised the customer that if the customer made corrupt payments to Dominguez, as the loan officer, the customer could obtain a lower interest rate without paying a prepayment penalty to Spencer Savings Bank.
Between August 2003 and December 2003, Dominguez accepted $55,529.57 in corrupt payments from the customer to influence the requested loan modification. Dominguez also admitted to accepting additional bribes from other bank customers in the amounts of $4,500 and $5,000, respectively.
The bank bribery charge to which Dominguez pleaded guilty carries a maximum potential penalty of 30 years in prison and a $1 million fine. Dominguez also previously pleaded guilty on May 23, 2012, to conspiracy to commit bank fraud, bank fraud, and bank bribery as a Spencer Savings loan officer in connection with a separate case. Sentencing related to the charges from both cases is currently scheduled for September 19, 2013.
U.S. Attorney Fishman credited special agents of the FBI, under the direction of Special Agent in Charge Aaron T. Ford in Newark, with the investigation leading to the guilty pleas.
The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Zahid N. Quraishi and Vikas Khanna of the U.S. Attorney’s Office Special Prosecutions Division in Newark.