Published: July 07, 2009 11:43 pm      

Feds: Contractor took kickbacks

PITTSBURGH — The former chief executive for a defense contractor with ties to U.S. Rep. John Murtha has been charged by federal prosecutors with taking about $200,000 in kickbacks from a subcontractor.

Richard S. Ianieri was charged in a one-count criminal information filed Monday in Pittsburgh.

The Doylestown man is accused of accepting two kickbacks of about $100,000 each from a subcontractor – identified only as “K” – while he was an officer of Coherent Systems International Corp.

In an April 2006 news release, Murtha, D-Johnstown, announced that Coherent and Kuchera Defense Systems were working “virtually as one company” on 14 contracts worth $30 million to develop high-tech military gear. Both companies then had offices in Windber.

Kuchera, which has given tens of thousands of dollars to Murtha’s campaign and political action committee, has been under scrutiny in recent months.

The company, owned by brothers William and Ronald Kuchera, has received $14.7 million in Murtha earmarks in the past two years.

It and another company, Kuchera Industries Inc., have received $53 million in federal contracts in this decade alone.

In January, FBI agents and Pentagon investigators raided Kuchera Defense Systems’ offices. No criminal charges are known to have been filed as a result. U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan in Pittsburgh has confirmed the raids related to an investigation by her office, but refused to say whether Murtha was part of the inquiry.

Dennis McGlynn, the Johns-town attorney who represents the Kucheras, told The Associated Press on Tuesday that he didn’t know anything about the charge filed against Ianieri. He said he has heard nothing about any continuing investigation into the Kuchera companies or Murtha since the January raid.

Ianieri did not answer two phone calls to his home in Doylestown. He didn’t immediately return a message left on an answering machine after a third call Tuesday.

A spokesman at Murtha’s office in Washington, D.C., also declined to comment on the charge.

Ianieri was president and chief executive officer of Coherent until it was sold to Fairfax, Va.-based Argon ST in August 2007, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Ianieri was a vice president at Argon until last year. Argon’s plant in the Windber area now is closed, a company spokesman said Tuesday.

Ianieri was charged via a federal criminal information, which typically indicates that a defendant is cooperating with prosecutors.

Argon’s CEO, Terry Collins, said in a statement that the company cannot comment on the criminal allegations because the actions happened before Argon purchased most of the assets of Coherent in August 2007. Though Ianieri continued working for Argon after the acquisition, he left that company in October, Collins said.

According to Murtha’s 2006 news release, Coherent and Kuchera worked together on a “sophisticated electronic precision targeting and communications system” for the Air Force.

The device was being used in Iraq. Murtha said Coherent had 35 employees and the Kuchera companies 325.

In April, the Navy suspended the Kucheras and their companies for “alleged fraud” including multiple instances of incorrect charges, along with allegations of defective pricing and ethical violations. Kuchera is appealing the suspension.

In an October 2006 news story in The Tribune-Democrat, Bill Kuchera, CEO of Kuchera Defense Systems, was quoted as saying that his company’s working relationship with Coherent was like a “seamless partnership.” He made the comment after it was announced that Coherent had awarded $1.9 million to Kuchera to continue work on a wireless targeting network.

Ianieri, then Coherent president, was quoted in the same story as saying that the relationship created opportunities for both companies to strengthen their futures.

In an April 2006 story, The Tribune-Democrat reported that Coherent’s plant near Windber was one it leased from a Kuchera subsidiary. Coherent set up plants in Windber and Uniontown to be near Kuchera’s Windber operation, it was reported.