TRENTON, N.J. (Legal Newsline) — New Jersey Attorney General Christopher S. Porrino announced July 7 that Alan Hilla of Jupiter, Florida. has pled guilty to his role in the Birsdall Services Group (BSG) scheme that involved more than $1 million illegal political contributions made through firm employees to evade the state’s pay-to-play laws.
“The many guilty pleas we have secured in this case hammer home an important message that criminal schemes aimed at evading New Jersey’s pay-to-play laws will be met with stern punishment,” Porrino said. “Our laws prevent politically connected firms from garnering public contracts based on campaign contributions but Birdsall’s executives gamed the system and secured millions of dollars in contracts for which they should have been disqualified.”
BSG had allegedly committed money laundering and had made false representations for government contracts. The company conducted a scheme in which it avoided state laws by disguising illegal corporate political contributions as personal contributions of employees. In addition to the company, eight other executives have plead guilty to their involvement.
“New Jersey’s pay-to-play laws seek to ensure fair and open public contracting, free of the sway of political interests,” said director Elie Honig of the Division of Criminal Justice. “By criminally prosecuting this firm and sending many of its top executives to prison, we have given those laws real teeth.”