News / Jail time looms as more defendants in Polar Air Cargo fraud case admit guilt

© Michael Flippo |

Seven of the 10 executives charged with fraud in the Polar Air Cargo case have now pleaded guilty to at least one charge. 

Orlando Wong and Carlton Llewellyn both admitted guilt this month, and Patrick Lau is in the process of changing his plea to guilty. 

Mr Wong and Mr Lau are both freight forwarders, from Able Freight and Cargo on Demand, respectively, while Mr Llewellyn worked for Polar Air Cargo.  

Fabiola Cino, founder of Gateway Cargo Consolidators, and her husband/business partner Alvaro Lopez also pleaded guilty in November, as did Ben Wei, from GSA Griffin Cargo. 

Just three executives, Lars Winkelbauer, Abilash Kurien, both from Polar, and GSA and forwarder Skye Xu appear to be sticking to their not guilty stance. They have called for a month’s extension, which was granted, allowing them to file their defence motions by 15 February. 

The guilty defendants have yet to be sentenced, but Mr Llewellyn must pay forfeiture of $347,879, and make restitution to Polar of $305,800. He faces a maximum sentence of five years in May, while sentencing guidelines for other defendants indicate jail terms of between 46 and 57 months. 

The Polar-employed defendants are accused of accepting millions of dollars in kickbacks from Polar’s GSAs and forwarders, and “reaped substantial financial benefits as a result of secret ownership interests in certain Polar vendors, in exchange for ensuring that those vendors, including the ones controlled by the vendor defendants, or which employed the vendor defendants, received favourable business arrangements with Polar”.  

The filing notes: “The fraud they perpetrated led to pervasive corruption of Polar’s business, touching nearly every aspect of the company’s operations for over a decade.”  

Mr Winkelbauer, who was extradited from Thailand last year to the US to face the charges, applied to go to Germany over Christmas following a sudden death in the family. However, the judge denied the application “in light of the defendant’s history and ties to Germany, and the fact that Germany does not extradite its own citizens to the United States”.