Two Guyanese operators of a Florida-based luxury charter jet company, responsible for a crash that prosecutors blame on fraud, have pleaded guilty.
According to plea agreements seen by Stabroek News, Andre Budhan, 42, and Joseph Singh, 37, two of the six Guyanese operators of the now defunct Ft. Lauderdale-based Platinum Jet Manage-ment, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and to defraud the US. Both men face a five-year-sentence and a US$250,000 fine and may also be ordered to make restitution to victims that the court sees fit. They are expected to be sentenced in New Jersey next month.
Budhan and Singh, along with Michael and Paul Brassington, Brian McKenzie and Francis Vieira were indicted on conspiracy, fraud and endangerment charges, connected with a crash in 2005.
The lawyers for the other accused, the Brassingtons, McKenzie and Vieira, have filed a motion in court seeking a 60-day extension to file their pre-trial motions. According to the motion, “because of the amount of discovery and the complexity of the issues, counsel will require additional time for discovery review and research before motions can be fully prepared and filed in this case.”
President, Chief Executive Officer and chief pilot of the company, Michael Brassington, 35, was named in the 23-count indictment along with his brother, Paul Brassington, 29; company vice-president; Budhan; Singh; McKenzie, 42, director of maintenance; and Vieira, 59, a pilot. All counts in the indictment carry a maximum five-year prison sentence, except for endangering the safety of an aircraft – for which Michael Brassington is charged – which carries a maximum 20-year prison sentence on conviction.
On February 2, 2005, a Platinum Jet operated flight from Teterboro Airport, New Jersey skidded off the runway and eventually crashed into a warehouse, causing a fire. In the indictment, the men are accused of “routinely undertaking and concealing dangerous fuelling and weight-distribution practices” over a three-year period, in or about November 2002 to in or about March 2005. Michael Brassington, McKenzie and Vieira are accused of filing paperwork on numerous occasions that fraudulently claimed that the planes being flown by Platinum out of Teterboro were up to 1,000 pounds lighter than their actual weight, in violation of FAA regulations.
It is alleged that Michael Brassington would instruct the company’s pilots to maximise charter profits by “tankering” fuel, involving loading extra fuel on the aircraft at locations where Platinum Jet had contracts for comparatively cheap fuel prices, like Teterboro Airport. The men would falsify FAA-required weight-and-balance graphs to conceal the weight configuration. Pilots were also instructed to do the same. Such “tankering,” according to the indictment, caused the aircraft to exceed their maximum allowable take-off and landing weights and forward Centre of Gravity (COG) limits, thereby endangering the safety of the aircraft during takeoff, flight and landing.
Additionally, the men are accused of having solicited charter flight customers for Platinum Jet using charter brokers, misrepresenting that it was acting in compliance with safety standards. In this regard, they allegedly said that the company’s on-demand commercial flights were actually non-commercial flights, which it was not certified to fly. During the period listed in the indictment, they are reported to have flown 85 such flights for more than US$1 million in compensation.
They are also accused of using unqualified pilots who failed to meet the FAA requirements and the indictment alleges that the captain of the ill-fated 2005 Teterboro flight was not certified to fly the commercial flights. He was not, however, charged.
