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SAYBOLT FINED AN ADDITIONAL $1.5 MILLION

Release Date: 01/29/99
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FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, JAN. 29, 1999

SAYBOLT FINED AN ADDITIONAL $1.5 MILLION


Saybolt Inc., a leading firm in the petroleum inspection industry which has laboratory facilities in Woburn, Mass., Kenilworth, N.J., and New Haven, Conn., pleaded guilty on Jan. 21, to violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) by bribing a Panamanian official, and was ordered to pay a $1.5 million fine by the U.S. District Court for the District of Massachusetts in Boston. Earlier this year, Saybolt was fined $3.4 million for violations of the Clean Air Act. In its plea, Saybolt admitted that it attempted to pay a $50,000 bribe to a Panamanian official to obtain a laboratory site near the Panama Canal and other concessions from the Panamanian government. In October 1998, David H. Mead, former president of Saybolt, was convicted of conspiracy, violation of the FCPA, and interstate travel to promote bribery. He is scheduled to be sentenced in March. The case was investigated by EPA’s Criminal Investigation Division with the assistance of the EPA’s National Enforcement Investigations Center, and was prosecuted by the U.S. Department of Justice.

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