Feds indict son of ex-Ecuadorian official convicted of money laundering; Gables home involved
When a former Ecuadorian official faced trial this year on charges of moving millions in cash bribes from Odebrecht contractors into Miami, there was one person conspicuously missing as a co-defendant: his son.
But now, five months after Ecuador’s ex-comptroller Carlos Ramon Polit was convicted of money laundering, prosecutors have followed up with an indictment charging the son, John Christopher Polit, with the same crime. Polit, 43, who has worked as a securities broker, is accused of washing more than $10 million in corrupt payments to his father through Miami’s banking system and real estate market.
The indictment alleges that between 2010 and 2018, the son conspired with the father by making the proceeds of Carlos Polit’s bribery schemes “disappear” through investments in Miami-area real estate, restaurants, a dry cleaner and other businesses. The son also created shell companies in Florida to hold these assets and “conceal” them for the benefit of the Polits and their relatives, according to the indictment.
John Polit surrendered to federal authorities on Tuesday. At his first appearance in Miami federal court, he was granted a $14 million personal surety bond secured with his family’s assets. Polit, who also had to make a $100,000 deposit as part of the bond, was released late Tuesday. He awaits arraignment on Sept. 19.
His defense attorneys, Omar Ortega and Reinaldo Dorta, said they’re reviewing the allegations. In an interview, Ortega noted that the indictments against the father and the son “mirror each other.”
“We will be defending John against these accusations,” Ortega said.
Father could face 20 years in prison
In many ways, the prosecution of the son will be a bookend to the father’s case. In April, a 12-person Miami federal jury unanimously found the 73-year-old former Ecuadorian official guilty of conspiring to commit money laundering and five related counts, carrying up to 20 years in prison. Polit, who immediately surrendered to prison authorities and is being held at the Miami Federal Detention Center, is scheduled for sentencing on Sept. 27.
The two-week corruption trial not only showcased Polit, but the giant Brazilian engineering firm Odebrecht, which bribed the former Ecuadorian official over several years to make $100 million in government fines on a hydroelectric power plant project vanish.
In 2016, Odebrecht admitted to a massive bribery scheme across the Americas and agreed to pay $2.6 billion in a record corruption settlement with the Justice Department. Polit’s trial was a spinoff of that high-profile scandal, offering for the first time the prosecution of an Odebrecht-linked defendant on conspiracy and money laundering charges in the United States.
At the father’s trial in Miami, his defense attorneys tried to compartmentalize the roles of the father and son, suggesting that Carlos Polit, who accepted the bribes from the Odebrecht contractors, had nothing do with the corruption proceeds being allegedly laundered by John Polit in Miami. But prosecutors Alexander Kramer and Michael Berger showed through a series of witnesses, wire transfers, bank deposits and investments that their roles were intertwined in a classic conspiracy.
“He used his power to ensure he got his money,” Justice Department prosecutor Kramer told the jurors in closing arguments, explaining that Carlos Polit didn’t have to launder the money himself to be found guilty. “He was just as responsible as his son. When his son was hiding that money [in Miami] ... that was Carlos Polit breaking the law.”
Laundered funds used to buy Cocoplum home
Polit’s son, John, was listed as “co-conspirator 1” in the indictment charging the father, who stood trial alone. John Polit’s name came up repeatedly in the bribery payment transfers through Panamanian and Miami banking accounts.
The money moved through intermediary companies into nearly a dozen local real estate deals, including the purchase of a Miami office building and a luxury home in exclusive Cocoplum in Coral Gables.
Carlos Polit’s defense attorneys, Howard Srebnick and Jacqueline Perczek, tried to distance their client from the alleged bribery-fueled money laundering scheme, saying the real criminals were the two former Odebrecht executives who cut plea deals in Brazil and non-prosecution agreements with the U.S. government for their testimony against Polit at the Miami trial.
Lived in swanky Miami River condo
Polit, who after his arrest in March 2022 was released on a $14 million bond and lived in a condo high-rise along the Miami River, wielded tremendous sway over Odebrecht when he became Ecuador’s comptroller in 2010. The Brazilian firm was found to have committed contractual and technical violations on a $320 million power-plant project built near an active volcano in central Ecuador called Minas de San Francisco, according to prosecutors.
Polit’s position, which was created to combat the fraudulent use of government funds, required him to sign off on public budgets that prosecutors say enabled him to demand more than $10 million in bribery payments from Odebrecht. In exchange, prosecutors contend, Polit made the government fines go away and allowed the engineering firm to continue working in Ecuador.
The Miami case, probed by Homeland Security Investigations, was built not only upon an electronic trail of financial records but also Odebrecht witnesses and recordings.
Jose Santos, who worked as an engineering and construction executive at Odebrecht for 38 years, testified that he was asked to resolve the company’s huge fines with the Ecuadorian government over the power-plant fiasco and then found himself being extorted by Polit in 2010.
Santos said Polit offered Odebrecht an ultimatum: Pay the comptroller an initial $6 million bribe to make the fines disappear or never work in Ecuador again.
Asked by a prosecutor if he paid Polit a series of cash bribes, Santos testified: “Yes, I did.”
At first, Santos said he delivered the cash in a carry-on bag to Polit at his apartment in Quito, and then he arranged for wire transfers and indirect payments by one of Odebrecht’s subcontractors in Ecuador.
During the Miami trial, prosecutors said that at one point Santos asked Polit what he was doing with all the bribery cash payments.
Polit told Santos: “My son in Miami makes the money disappear.”
As part of the indictment, prosecutors also accused Polit of a separate conspiracy involving accepting $510,000 in bribery payments from an insurance executive who lost his Ecuadorian government contracts to a rival businessman. After the payments were made, Polit restored his business dealings with the government, prosecutors said. Some of that money was also transferred to Miami, prosecutors said.
All of these allegations figure significantly in the new indictment filed against his son.
Five years ago, McClatchy-Miami Herald and other news media collaborated on an investigative project that zeroed in on Odebrecht’s parallel off-books accounting system. Leaked documents showed links between Polit’s Miami-based son and a U.S. shell company, Ventures Overseas LLC, which became a pass-through for Odebrecht’s bribery payments to the father.
The McClatchy-Miami Herald investigation showed that the son had taken on mortgages on several pricey properties in the Miami area, including the luxurious home in Cocoplum that had earlier been purchased outright.
This story was originally published September 12, 2024 at 4:33 PM.
