Monday, May 19, 2025

Bureaucrats steal from the taxpayer... USAID official plead guilty in bribery scheme involving $550M

SUN: Towson consultant, USAID official plead guilty in bribery scheme involving $550M


An empty court room. Mail Tribune / Julia Moore - Julia Moore



A former U.S. Agency for International Development official admitted in federal court this week that he accepted bribes from a Towson-based consultant and other contractors to steer agency decisions on $552.5 million’s worth of government contracts.

Roderick Watson, who worked as a contracting officer for USAID, admitted to manipulating the federal agency’s procurement process for over a dozen contracts while accepting a stream of bribes in a decadelong conspiracy, according to court filings unsealed Wednesday.

Watson and Walter Barnes III, the founder of the Towson-based consulting firm that won many of those contracts, both pleaded guilty Monday in U.S. District Court in Greenbelt.

Barnes, 46, is the founder of Vistant, formerly known as PM Consulting Group. Court filings in his criminal case do not name the company involved in the case, though federal records say Barnes resigned as chairman and president of Vistant in 2023 after being suspended from contracting with USAID for procurement misconduct.

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