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Press Release

Chief Executive Officer Of International Metallurgical Company Pleads Guilty To Conspiring To Export Specialty Metals To Iran

For Immediate Release
U.S. Attorney's Office, Eastern District of New York

Earlier today in federal court in Brooklyn, Erdal Kuyumcu, the chief executive officer of Global Metallurgy, LLC, a company based in Woodside, New York, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act in connection with the export of specialty metals from the United States to Iran.  Today’s plea proceeding took place before Chief United States District Judge Dora L. Irizarry.  

The guilty plea was announced by Robert L. Capers, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, and John P. Carlin, Assistant Attorney General for National Security.

As detailed in the criminal information to which he pleaded guilty and in related court filings, Kuyumcu, a United States citizen, conspired to export from the United States to Iran a metallic powder composed of cobalt and nickel without having obtained the required license from the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).  The metallic powder can be used to coat gas turbine components, such as turbine blades, and can also be used in aerospace, missile production, and nuclear applications.  Such specialized metals are closely regulated by the U.S. Department of Commerce to combat nuclear proliferation and protect national security, and exporting them without an OFAC license is illegal.  Kuyumcu and others conspired to obtain over one thousand pounds of the metallic powder from a U.S.-based supplier for export to Iran.  To hide the true destination of the goods from the U.S. supplier, Kuyumcu and a co-conspirator arranged for the metallic powder to be shipped first to Turkey and then to Iran. 

In announcing the guilty plea, Mr. Capers extended his grateful appreciation to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, New York Field Office, and the U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Industry and Security, Office of Export Enforcement, New York Field Office, the agencies that led the government’s investigation.

At sentencing, Kuyumcu faces up to 20 years in prison a $1 million fine. 

The case is being prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Tiana A. Demas and Ameet B. Kabrawala of the Eastern District of New York, with assistance from Trial Attorney David Recker of the National Security Division’s Counterintelligence and Export Control Section.

The Defendant:

ERDAL KUYUMCU
Age:  44
Woodside, New York

E.D.N.Y. Docket No. 16-CR-308 (DLI)

Updated June 14, 2016

Topic
National Security