On September 28, 2016, Rolando Suarez pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court, Miami, Florida, to conspiracy to bribe a public official, specifically a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) safety inspector. Suarez is president of Avcom Avionics & Instruments, Incorporated (Avcom), an FAA-authorized repair station. 

 

From 2010 to 2013, he employed an active full-time FAA inspector who provided Avcom with unauthorized technical publications, notices, and warnings of FAA inspections and investigations and disclosed competitors’ confidential information. In exchange, Suarez provided the FAA inspector with money and gifts—inducements to perform activities in violation of the inspector’s official lawful duty.