New York: The US Department of Justice has charged a former aerospace outsourcing executive of Indian-origin for conspiring with engineering firms not to poach each other’s workers, a conspiracy he was orchestrating for well over a decade that is said to have hit thousands of workers.
Mahesh Patel, a resident of Glastonbury, Connecticut, and a former director of global engineering services at a major aerospace engineering company had enforced this agreement along with other suppliers to keep labour costs down and reap profits, the filings in a federal court in Connecticut Thursday said.
According to the Wall Street Journal, Patel was a former employee of Pratt and Whitney, a firm that supplies engines to Airbus and military aircraft manufacturer Lockheed Martin.
During the last decade, there have been instances when Patel has confronted and berated suppliers who backtracked on this agreement by threatening to punish them by blocking valuable access to projects, according to a press release from the Justice Department.
Patel was arrested and produced before a federal court in Hartford via a video link.
He was released on a USD 100,000 bond and placed under travel restrictions.
“No one should be illegally denied the opportunity to pursue better jobs, higher pay and greater benefits,” said Peter Jongbloed, an official in the Connecticut federal prosecutor’s office.
“Given the significance of major defence and aerospace companies to Connecticut’s economy, it is vital that the labour market in this industry remain fair, open and competitive to our workers,” said Peter S. Jongbloed, Counsel to the US Attorney for the District of Connecticut.
Assistant Attorney General Jonathan Kanter said that “thousands of workers have been victimised over a long period of time” by the alleged scheme under which corporate executives undermined the careers of their own workers in order to reap undeserved profits and deprive our fellow citizens of opportunities to earn a competitive wage”, it said.
These charges were part of an ongoing federal antitrust probe launched into market allocation in the aerospace engineering services industry, which was conducted by the Antitrust Division’s New York Office, the US Attorney’s Office for the District of Connecticut and the New Haven and New York Resident Agencies of the DCIS, the press release added.
PTI
