TX Oilman Wyatt Sentenced to 1 year, 1 Day in Oil-for-Food Case
NEW YORK (AP) -- Texas oilman Oscar Wyatt Jr. was sentenced to one year and one day in prison Tuesday after pleading guilty last month to conspiracy to violate the rules of the U.N. oil-for-food program.
Wyatt, 83, had agreed to be sentenced to 18 to 24 months in prison and forfeit $11 million when he pleaded guilty in October to a federal conspiracy charge, conceding that he approved a $200,000 illegal payment directly to an Iraqi bank account in December 2001.
Before pleading guilty on the 12th day of his trial, Wyatt had insisted he never paid an illegal surcharge to the Iraqi government to win oil contracts.
Prosecutors said he paid millions of dollars to Iraqi officials to get an unfair share of contracts connected to the oil-for-food program, which ran from 1996 to 2003.
The program permitted the Iraqi government to sell oil primarily to buy food and medicine for suffering Iraqis. It was meant to help Iraqis cope with U.N. sanctions, but authorities said the program was corrupted when Iraqi officials began demanding illegal surcharges in return for contracts to buy Iraqi oil.
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