THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Tuesday, January 24, 1995 TAG: 9501240254
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY KERRY DEROCHI, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 59 lines
A former Army project manager was sentenced to 16 months in prison Monday for accepting $260,000 in illegal payments from a South Carolina contractor.
John A. Irons, a midlevel manager at Fort Eustis, was fined $30,000 for his role in a five-year scheme that helped steer $1.8 million in contracts to Custom Aids Inc. of Swansea, S.C.
The punishment, announced Monday morning in U.S. District Court in Norfolk, was the maximum allowed by federal sentencing guidelines.
``The public should not have the impression that this is an everyday occurrence, one that the court would condone or put its stamp of approval on,'' said Judge Rebecca Beach Smith, at the close of the hourlong hearing.
Irons, 60, had worked as a government training-aid specialist when he cut a deal in 1988 with Richard O. Kneece, president of the South Carolina company.
Irons, who was in charge of a project that produced thermal images of enemy vehicles used in target practice, was ``tired of making money for other people and not himself,'' according to testimony Monday in federal court.
As part of the deal, Irons agreed to use his influence to ensure Custom Training Aids won contracts from the Army Training Center. In exchange, Kneece promised Irons one-third of the company's gross profits from any of the contracts it received.
In the next few years, Kneece's company made $675,000 in profits, earning Irons about $260,000. The biggest payoff came in 1991 when Irons received $200,000 for helping Kneece land a $1.6 million contract.
The scheme ended when the two got caught last year in a joint investigation by the Army's Criminal Investigative Service and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Both Kneece and Irons pleaded guilty in November for illegally accepting gratuities.
Kneece will be sentenced this morning in federal court. He faces up to two years in prison.
Irons, a former Army man who served in both the Korean and Vietnam wars, said nothing during Monday's hearing.
His attorney, Andrew Sacks, asked the judge for leniency because of Irons' former military service and because he needed to care for his ill wife. Presenting letters from two doctors, Sacks said Irons was the only person who could help his wife, who was injured in a car accident more than 12 years ago.
``He has transgressed,'' Sacks said. ``He has let people down. But that has to be weighed against 60 years, 60 years of a life of good living and achievement.''
But federal prosecutor Alan Salsbury reminded the judge that Irons was not guilty of just a single criminal offense.
``The defendant has been guilty of a continuous, ongoing pattern of criminal conduct,'' Salsbury said. ``These crimes were motivated by sheer greed.''
KEYWORDS: SENTENCING FRAUD MILITARY CONTRACT by CNB