Summary

On October 24, Paul G. Bedewi, former adjunct professor at George Washington University (GWU) and deputy director of the DOT-funded National Crash Analysis Center in Ashburn, VA, pled guilty in U.S. District Court, Washington, DC to one felony count of theft from programs receiving federal funds. Bedewi was charged with embezzling $78,602 in DOT and GWU research funds between August 2002 and June 2004 through illegal stipends and unallowable purchases. Our investigation found that Bedewi caused the Center to issue $36,150 in unauthorized and fraudulent graduate assistant stipends to his wife; Bedewi also made unauthorized charges totaling $42,452 using a GWU-issued purchase card. No sentencing date has been set.

Paul Bedewi is the cousin of Nabih Bedewi, former GWU engineering professor and director of the crash center, who was sentenced in June 2005 to over three years in prison and ordered to pay $872,221 in restitution for embezzling nearly $1 million in DOT and GWU research funds.