New Jersey Real Estate Broker Pleads Guilty- Foreign Bribery Scheme Involving $800 M RE Deal

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/new-jersey-real-estate-broker-pleads-guilty-role-foreign-bribery-scheme-involving-800-million

Department of Justice
Office of Public Affairs

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Friday, January 5, 2018

New Jersey Real Estate Broker Pleads Guilty to Role in Foreign Bribery Scheme Involving $800 Million International Real Estate Deal

A New Jersey-based real estate broker pleaded guilty today to foreign bribery charges in connection with his role in a scheme to bribe a foreign official in the Middle East to secure a real estate deal for a South Korean construction company, Keangnam Enterprises Co. Ltd. (Keangnam).
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Joo Hyun Bahn, aka Dennis Bahn, 39, of Tenafly, New Jersey, pleaded guilty in federal court in Manhattan to one count of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) and one count of violating the FCPA. U.S. District Judge Edgardo Ramos of the Southern District of New York accepted the guilty plea. Sentencing is scheduled for June 29 at 11 am.

Bahn was charged alongside his father, Ban Ki Sang (Ban), and Malcolm Harris in December 2016. Ban was a senior executive at Keangnam. Harris, an arts and fashion consultant and blogger, held himself out as an agent of a foreign official.
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According to admissions made in connection with Bahn’s plea, from between February 2014 and May 2015, Bahn joined a scheme to pay bribes to a foreign official in a country in the Middle East in order to facilitate the sale by Keangnam of a commercial building known as Landmark 72 in Hanoi, Vietnam, to the Middle Eastern country’s sovereign wealth fund. In particular, Bahn, Ban and others agreed to pay $500,000 upfront to the foreign official, who he believed made decisions about the acquisition of assets for the Middle Eastern country’s sovereign wealth fund, in order to corruptly influence him to cause the sovereign wealth fund to purchase Landmark 72. In furtherance of the scheme, Bahn and Ban transferred $500,000 to Harris for him to pass on to the foreign official. In related proceedings, codefendant Harris admitted that he double-crossed his codefendants, and simply stole the $500,000 bribe.
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