Bribe

A federal corruption investigation spread to a second city Thursday when a Santa Fe Springs councilman agreed to plead guilty to receiving bribes from the owner of a medical marijuana store. Joseph Serrano Sr. will admit to one federal count of felony bribery in connection with allegations that he repeatedly shook down a dispensary operator who was working as an FBI informant. According the plea agreement released Thursday, Serrano took a total of $11,500 in payments in 2010 and 2011 in exchange for promises that Serrano would work to stave off attempts by the city to shut down dispensaries.

As part of a criminal bribery probe, the Los Angeles County district attorney's office served search warrants at the homes and campus offices of two high-ranking Pasadena City College officials Thursday morning, authorities said. Investigators removed documents and computers belonging to Richard Van Pelt, vice president of administrative services, and Alfred Hutchings, the college's facilities services supervisor, said Dave Demerjian, head of the district attorney's Public Integrity Division.

WASHINGTON - TheU.S. Supreme Courtrefused to hear former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman's challenge to his bribery conviction, preserving rulings that say prosecutors and jurors can decide when a favor linked to a campaign contribution amounts to a bribe. Monday's decision means Siegelman is likely to be sent back to prison. In 2007, a judge in Alabama sentenced him to seven years, but he was released a year later to appeal his conviction. He had won the support of more than 100 former top state attorneys as well as prominent election law experts.

WASHINGTON - Former Alabama Gov. Don Siegelman was charged with bribery and sent to prison because, prosecutors said, a wealthy hospital executive gave him $500,000 in exchange for appointing him to a state hospital planning board. But this half-million-dollar "bribe" did not enrich Siegelman. Instead, the disputed money was a contribution to help fund a statewide referendum on whether Alabama should have a state lottery to support education, a pet cause of the governor's. The Supreme Court is set to decide as soon as Monday whether to hear Siegelman's final appeal, which raises a far-reaching question: Is a campaign contribution a bribe if a politician agrees to do something in return, or is it to be expected that politicians will do favors for their biggest supporters?

A former executive at an Orange County valve company pleaded guilty to bribing a Chinese government official, the U.S. Attorney's office announced Tuesday. Paul Cosgrove, former executive vice president of the Rancho Santa Margarita-based Control Components Inc., admitted to taking part in a foreign bribery scheme that resulted in a profit of $46.5 million, according to the U.S. Attorney in Los Angeles. Before U.S. District Judge James V. Selna in Santa Ana, he pleaded guilty to one count of making a corrupt payment of about $7,500 to a foreign government official in China.

The California State Teachers' Retirement System is suing Wal-Mart Stores Inc. executives and board members, accusing them of using bribery and corruption to gain approval from Mexican government officials to build new stores. Late Thursday, the board of CalSTRS, the country's second-largest public pension fund, filed the so-called derivative lawsuit seeking changes in the corporate governance of the world's biggest retailer. "CalSTRS is seeking to remedy the damages sustained by Wal-Mart as a result of alleged gross misconduct by Wal-Mart's executive officers and directors," CalSTRS Chief Executive Jack Ehnes said.

Former Upland Mayor John Pomierski faces up to 10 years in federal prison after pleading guilty Thursday to bribery and admitting to accepting $5,000 to help a business obtain a permit. Pomierski, 58, became the third person to be convicted in the bribery scheme, in which he allegedly demanded about $70,000 in payments from the separate owners of a sports bar and a medical marijuana cooperative to help them obtain permits and eliminate other requirements beginning in 2007, according to federal prosecutors.

The man with eight pounds of methamphetamine in his carry-on bag stood in the snaking security line at Los Angeles International Airport's Terminal 4, inching toward the checkpoint, when a TSA screener approached. But it wasn't to stop the contraband, according to prosecutors. It was to make sure it got through. The screener, John Whitfield, allegedly told the man to get to the back of the line so he and his luggage would get to the X-ray machines when Whitfield's shift started.

WASHINGTON — The General Services Administration's inspector general is investigating possible kickbacks and bribes in an agency already shaken by a scandal over a pricey Las Vegas-area conference, he told a congressional hearing Monday. In response to questions from Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Vista), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, Brian Miller said he was investigating "all sorts of improprieties, including bribes, possibly kickbacks. " "We do have other ongoing investigations," Miller said, adding that witnesses told him waste was "widespread" in the GSA's Pacific Rim region, which staged the Las Vegas-area conference for nearly $823,000 in 2010.

Medco Health Solutions has agreed to pay $2.75 million and change its internal procedures to settle claims that it paid millions in bribes to win a contract to provide prescription drugs to members of the California Public Employees' Retirement System. The settlement was the latest development in a case that began in 2004 and involved allegations of dealings between the then-head of CalPERS, Federico Buenrostro Jr., and a paid Medco consultant and former CalPERS board member, Alfred J.R. Villalobos, who helped secure the $26-million contract in 2006.