Tulsa Engineering Firm Executive Pleads Guilty to Bribing Public Official

Acting United States Attorney Thomas Scott Woodward announced that the president of a Tulsa engineering firm pleaded guilty today in federal court in Tulsa to bribing a Tulsa public works official.

Kenneth Kirk Shoemaker, age 46, of Bartlesville, president of FBS, Inc. and an officer of FBS Engineers, Inc., both Tulsa companies, pleaded guilty to procurement fraud bribery. He also agreed to pay the City of Tulsa restitution in the amount of $105,000. Shoemaker admitted that he paid $7,500 to former Tulsa Public Works employee Albert Martinez on July 22, 2008, as partial payment to steer a $450,756 public works contract to FBS, Inc. The total bribe payment was to be $25,000.

Shoemaker is the third defendant to plead guilty in this public corruption case. His sentencing is set for December 14, 2009, after the completion of a pre-sentence investigation report by the U.S. Probation Office. Shoemaker faces a prison sentence of up to 10 years and a fine of $250,000.

U.S. District Judge Terrence Kern is presiding in the case. The plea today was before Magistrate Judge T. Lane Wilson. Assistant U.S. Attorneys Clinton J. Johnson, Joseph F. Wilson and Catherine J. Depew are prosecuting for the government. The investigation was undertaken by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation Division.