{"id":28400,"date":"2011-04-14T21:12:20","date_gmt":"2011-04-15T03:12:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=28400"},"modified":"2011-04-14T21:12:20","modified_gmt":"2011-04-15T03:12:20","slug":"former-corrections-official-charged-with-bribery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2011\/04\/former-corrections-official-charged-with-bribery\/","title":{"rendered":"Former corrections official charged with bribery"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>A former <a href=\"http:\/\/corrections.state.nm.us\/\" target=\"_blank\">N.M. Corrections Department<\/a> official has been indicted by a federal grand jury for taking well over $200,000 in bribes in exchange for steering construction contracts to a roofing company.<\/p>\n<p>Laurie Chapman, 50 and the former facilities manager for the Corrections Department, is facing 30 counts alleging that, between February 2007 and August 2009, she solicited and accepted $237,080 in bribes from Omni Development Corporation in exchange for the company getting $4 million in construction and maintenance jobs at Corrections Department facilities.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cCorruption of this nature strikes at the heart of good government and erodes public confidence,\u201d U.S. Attorney Kenneth J. Gonzales said in a news release. \u201c\u2026 This kind of betrayal of the public\u2019s trust cannot and will not be tolerated.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Chapman faces 30 counts of theft or bribery concerning programs receiving federal funds. Each count includes a possible prison sentence of 10 years, supervised release of three years, and a fine of $250,000. Read the full indictment <a href=\"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/Documents\/ChapmanIndictment.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The indictment also seeks forfeiture of property that can be traced to the money Chapman allegedly took.<\/p>\n<p>The indictment follows a 10-month investigation by the FBI and U.S. attorney.<\/p>\n<p>From the U.S. attorney\u2019s news release:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cThe indictment alleges that, in her capacity as NMCD Facilities Manager, Chapman selected vendors to perform maintenance and repairs on buildings operated by NMCD. In March 2007, Chapman allegedly implemented a \u2018price agreement\u2019 procedure that permitted her to select a roofing company to perform work for NMCD without going through a competitive bidding process.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The company made the payments to Chapman, the news release states, in numerous ways \u2013 cash, online transfers, checks and credit card payments.<\/p>\n<p>Some of the payments went directly to Chapman, the release states, while others went to a construction company she formed that \u201cdid not do any work in exchange for the payments.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The indictment identifies 30 illegal payments \u2013 ranging from $1,000 to $39,000 \u2013 allegedly made by Omni to Chapman and her company.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A former N.M. Corrections Department official has been indicted by a federal grand jury for taking well over $200,000 in bribes in exchange for steering construction contracts to a roofing company.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[142,114,107],"class_list":["post-28400","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-crime","tag-public-corruption","tag-roundhouse"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28400"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28400\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}