Federal prosecutors crack down on bribery schemes between South Florida and Latin America

A former South Florida banker convicted of financial fraud has been charged anew in a foreign corruption case alleging that he and others paid hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes to Honduran officials to secure more than $10 million in police uniform contracts for a U.S. company, federal authorities say.

Aldo Nestor Marchena, a former asset manager with Wells Fargo Bank, fled the United States in 2021 after he was sentenced to nearly four years on a wire fraud charge accusing him of stealing nearly $1 million from a customer, according to court records. Marchena, 50, formerly of Boca Raton, was arrested last year by Colombian authorities.

Now, Marchena has been indicted again on charges of conspiring with Carl Alan Zaglin, the owner of an Atlanta-area manufacturer of law enforcement uniforms and accessories. Together, they’re accused of paying at least $166,000 in bribes through South Florida bank accounts to the former head of a Honduran government agency and other officials who procured uniforms for the national police, according to an indictment filed in Miami federal court.

Marchena is awaiting extradition from Colombia on the prior financial fraud case and a related bond-jumping charge, his defense attorney, Jose Castaneda, told the Miami Herald on Thursday. Castaneda is not representing him in the Honduran corruption case.

Zaglin, 68, the owner of Atlanco in Marietta, Georgia, was arrested in mid-December and pleaded not guilty to conspiracy, foreign corruption and money laundering charges. He was released on a $1.35 million bond.

His Miami attorney, Robert Perez, issued a statement saying Zaglin “is innocent of these charges.”

“We look forward to challenging these charges in court,” Perez said Thursday, declining to comment further because of the pending criminal case.

How was the Honduran corruption scheme unearthed?

Zaglin, Marchena and others associated with the Atlanta-area law enforcement supply business are accused of conspiring to bribe Honduran government officials, including Francisco Roberto Cosenza Centeno, the former executive director of the Honduran government entity known as TASA. Cosenza, 65, the third defendant in the foreign corruption indictment, has been designated as a fugitive along with Marchena, according to federal court records.

Between March 2015 and November 2019, Marchena, Zaglin and others obtained more than $10 million in uniform contracts from the Honduran government and used some of the proceeds to make the bribery payments to Cosenza and other officials, according to the indictment. In an effort to conceal the bribery payments, Marchena, Zaglin, Cosenza and others laundered the proceeds through bank accounts and front companies in the United States and Belize, according to the indictment.

The Honduran corruption scheme was uncovered after federal prosecutors had brought previous charges against a South Florida businessman, his father and others who paid bribes to government officials in Bolivia to obtain a tear-gas contract.

Bryan Berkman, former CEO of Bravo Tactical Solutions in Tamarac, his father, Luis Berkman, and another businessman were convicted of paying more than $1 million in kickbacks to high-ranking Bolivian officials to obtain a $5.6 million tear-gas defense contract with the conservative government of former interim Bolivian President Jeanine Áñez, who succeeded socialist leader Evo Morales in 2019.

As part of their plea deals, the Berkmans not only helped federal prosecutor Eli Rubin make the Bolivian tear-case case, but they later provided additional evidence to him in the Honduran police-uniform investigation, according to their defense attorneys.

The Berkmans were insiders because they worked for Zaglin’s Atlanta-area law enforcement supply company and were involved in the alleged Honduran bribery scheme, according to the indictment. The father and son are also related to Marchena.

But because of their cooperation with the U.S. Attorney’s Office and Homeland Security Investigations, the father and son were not charged in the second case — though they were named as “co-conspirators.”

“Luis Berkman and his son, Bryan, are named in the [Honduran] indictment because they cooperated and provided material evidence that led to this [second] indictment,” said Luis Berkman’s defense attorney, Joseph DeMaria, a former federal prosecutor. “This is the way the system is supposed to work when a defendant pleads guilty and agrees to assist the government.”

In June 2022, Luis Berkman was sentenced to 38 months in the Bolivian tear-gas but it was later reduced to 32 months for his cooperation. DeMaria said his additional assistance in the Honduran corruption case should qualify him for even less prison time, possibly leading to his release this year. His client also faces 16 months of home confinement as part of his probation.

Bryan Berkman’s defense attorney, Michael Nadler, a former federal prosecutor, agreed with DeMaria. Bryan Berkman was initially sentenced to 28 months in the Bolivian case, which was reduced to 21 months for his cooperation. He has been released from prison and is serving 16 months of home confinement as part of his probation.

“My client immediately took responsibility and accepted the consequences of his actions,” Nadler said. “In doing so, he fully cooperated and provided truthful information that substantially assisted the government.”