Columbia, South Carolina ---- United States Attorney Bill Nettles stated today that former Covan World Wide Moving, Inc., manager Ronald James Niemi, Jr., age 45, of Wesley Chapel, Florida, has been convicted of Mail Fraud, a violation of 18 U.S.C. § 1341, after a five-day trial in Columbia that concluded Monday. Senior United States District Judge Joseph F. Anderson, Jr., of Columbia presided over the trial and will sentence Niemi at a later date.
Evidence presented at the trial established that Ronald James Niemi was the manager of Covan’s Augusta facility from 2009 through 2011. Covan packs and moves soldiers when they are transferred from one base to another. Covan is paid according to the weight of the household goods moved. Niemi falsified certificates indicating the net weight of the household goods was higher than it actually was, causing the United States to pay more to move soldiers than it should have. At trial, the Government demonstrated forty instances when this took place.
Mr. Nettles stated the maximum penalty for Mail Fraud is imprisonment for 20 years and/or a fine of $250,000.
The case was investigated by agents of the Army Criminal Investigation Command and the Defense Criminal Investigative Service. Assistant United States Attorneys Winston Holliday and Ben Garner of the Columbia office are prosecuting the case. ##
Source: U.S. Department of Justice, Office of the United States Attorneys
