News / Former Polar Air US customer service chief Schirmer jailed for fraud

Polar Air Cargo’s former senior director of customer service for the Americas, Robert Schirmer, has been jailed for 18 months for his part in a scheme to defraud the all-cargo carrier of $33m over more than a decade.

Having already admitted conspiracy to commit wire fraud and honest services wire fraud, Mr Schirmer sentenced yesterday by the Southern District Court of New York.

The former executive was also ordered to do 200 hours of community service after his release and agreed to repay the carrier $9.3m and forfeit some $938,000 in stolen gains.

Mr Schirmer, alongside 10 other Polar-employed defendants had been accused of accepting millions of dollars in kickbacks from Polar’s GSAs and forwarders and having held secret ownership interests in “certain Polar vendors”.

They had received the money “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”.

Seven of the 10 executives charged with fraud have admitted at least one charge, with Orlando Wong, Carlton Llewellyn and Patrick Lau admitting guilt at the start of the year. Mr Lau was also given an 18-month prison sentence.