Pittsburgh area defense contractor found guilty of defrauding the Pentagon

A federal jury has found a Pittsburgh area defense contractor guilty on 13 counts of violating federal fraud and tax laws. 

According to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Western District of Pennsylvania, 75-year-old Donald Smith was found guilty of eight charges of wire fraud and five counts of failing to file a corporate tax return. 

From 2019 through 2023, evidence showed that Smith underwent a process that defrauded the Defense Logistics Agency, the department that provides material to every branch of the U.S. military. 

Smith presented products to the agency and charged payments of more than $1 million dollars, but the products were not what he promised or described. 

On top of the scheme, Smith also failed to file corporate tax returns reporting any of the payments his company received during that time. 

The jury deliberated for approximately two hours before returning the guilty verdict. For the wire fraud counts, Smith is facing a maximum sentence of up to 20 years of imprisonment or a fine of up to $250,000. As for the tax violations, he is facing up to a year in prison on each count or a fine of no more than $100,000 or twice the gain from the offense. 

He will be sentenced at a later date.