No Prison for UN Oil-For-Food Defendant

December 13, 2007
AP
Source: http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5g4rc017lg9UdgCzTjtYSwbJ2eU0AD8TGU3CG0


NEW YORK (AP) — A Houston oil trader with a minor role in the United Nations' oil-for-food scandal will not go to prison after admitting wrongdoing, a judge said Thursday.

Ludmil Dionissiev, 61, pleaded guilty earlier this year to a smuggling charge for helping bring Iraqi oil into the United States in January 2001.

In sentencing Dionissiev to two years of probation and ordering him to pay a $5,000 fine, U.S. District Judge Denny Chin called him the least culpable of those charged.

Before he was sentenced, Dionissiev apologized, saying he knew what he was doing was wrong when he committed his crime. He said it was the biggest mistake of his life.

I'd like to apologize to the United Nations for my participation in the case, said Dionissiev, who moved to the United States from Bulgaria 16 years ago.

In all, 10 people and five companies have been charged in connection with schemes to cheat the oil-for-food program, which ran from 1996 to 2003. The program let the Iraqi government sell oil primarily to buy humanitarian goods.

Last month, the judge sentenced 83-year-old Oscar Wyatt Jr. to a year and a day in prison after the Texas oilman interrupted his trial by pleading guilty to conspiracy in the case.

Korean businessman Tongsun Park was sentenced earlier this year to five years in prison for accepting at least $2 million to work on Iraq's behalf to influence the oil-for-food program.