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Rhode Island man sentenced to nearly 6 years for bribing two Army contracting officials at Schofield

A 66-year-old former government contractor was sentenced Friday to 70 months’ imprisonment for his role in a bribery and kickback scheme to secure contracts with the U.S. Army.

Chief Judge J. Michael Seabright sentenced John Winslett of Rhode Island to five years and 10 months, followed by three years of supervised release, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for Hawaii and several other agencies involved announced today in a news release.

Winslett admitted to paying bribes of over $100,000 from 2011 to 2018 to two U.S. Army contracting officials who worked at the Range at Schofield Barracks, according to court documents and information presented in court.

The bribes included cash, automobiles and firearms.

In exchange, Winslett’s employer received federal contracts worth at least $19 million.

Winslett also admitted to accepting kickbacks totaling $723,333.33 from a local subcontractor for assigning the contracts to him.

Army Criminal Investigation Command, U.S. Defense Criminal Investigative Service and the FBI investigated this case.

The case was prosecuted by Laura Connelly and Justin Weitz of the Criminal Division’s Fraud Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Marc Wallenstein.

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