Summary

On November 9, 2015, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) debarred Matthew Williams and Clear Span Construction Products (Clear Span), Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for three years. Williams and Clear Span were previously suspended as a result of an Information charging Williams with wire fraud related to the falsification of bridge deck plans and engineering drawings. Clear Span manufactured stay-in-place metal bridge deck forms that were placed between structural steel and pre-stressed concrete bridge girders.

In January 2014, Williams pleaded guilty to wire fraud. He admitted that on multiple occasions he forged or affixed the seal and signature of unwitting Professional Engineers (P.E.) on bridge plans. He then transmitted these engineering documents to prime contractors on the FHWA funded projects. According to the signed guilty plea, Williams forged the engineers' seals by cutting and pasting, or "photo shopping" the P.E. certification seals onto new un-reviewed and unapproved deck form construction drawings.  The investigation revealed that Williams submitted over 500 falsified documents on more than 75 federal and state funded highway projects in 13 states. 

The FHWA concluded that, as vice-president of Clear Span, Williams devised a scheme to defraud the FHWA and state transportation agencies participating in the Federal-Aid Highway Program.  

We conducted the investigation with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, with assistance from the FHWA.

Note: Exclusion actions (suspensions and debarments) are frequently for a specific period of time and the System for Award Management "Sam.gov" should be consulted to find whether a company is currently excluded.