Naval Employee Pleads Guilty To Accepting More Than $250,000 In Cash Bribes From Unauthorized Liquor Buyers

The U.S. Justice Department released the below information:

An employee of the U.S. Department of the Navy  pleaded guilty today to accepting more than $250,000 in cash bribes from three people making unauthorized liquor purchases from the Navy Exchange Service Command where he worked, announced Acting Assistant Attorney General Kenneth A. Blanco of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division and Special Agent in Charge Leo Lamont of the Naval Criminal Investigative Service’s (NCIS) Northeast Field Office.

Eric Jex, 29, of Uniondale, New York, pleaded guilty to one count of bribery before U.S. District Judge Joanna Seybert of the Eastern District of New York. Sentencing is set for Feb. 2, 2018.

According to admissions made in connection with his guilty plea, as a supervisory sales associate at the NEX at Mitchel Field in Garden City, New York, Jex was responsible for preparing and processing retail transactions, and he had direct authority to make decisions concerning large liquor orders and shipments from the NEX’s warehouse. He was also subject to policies limiting access to the NEX’s goods to authorized personnel, such as Navy service members, and requiring NEX employees to check purchasers’ IDs. In connection with his guilty plea, Jex admitted that from approximately November 2015 through December 2016, he agreed with three unauthorized purchasers, one of whom had a New York State Liquor License, to arrange repeated large purchases of liquor from the NEX. He allowed the three unauthorized purchasers access to the NEX’s low prices and frequently provided additional price-matching discounts to which the purchasers were not entitled. In exchange, the three unauthorized purchasers paid cash bribes to Jex, typically $5 to $20 per case of liquor. According to plea documents, these bribes added up to more than $250,000 for the period of the scheme.

The NCIS; U.S. Treasury Department, Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau; and the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance, Criminal Investigations Division investigated this case. Trial Attorneys Luke Cass and Andrew Laing of the Criminal Division’s Public Integrity Section are prosecuting the case with the assistance of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Eastern District of New York.