Summary

On September 17, 2012, Aileen Bermudez and Geovanni Hernandez, former employees of Aircraft Transparencies Repair (ATR) and Transparencies Engineering Group (TEG), were sentenced in U.S. District Court, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, to mail and wire fraud charges in conjunction with a scheme involving the false representation that aircraft windows were overhauled properly when they were not.

Ms. Bermudez was sentenced to three years of probation and ordered to pay $23,200 in restitution, and a $100 special assessment.  Ms. Hernandez was sentenced to three years of probation and ordered to pay $10,200 in restitution and a $100 special assessment.  Ms. Bermudez and Ms. Hernandez pled guilty in May 2012.

The two, along with 14 others employees of ATR and TEG, were charged with conspiring to sell and falsely certify to commercial aviation customers the airworthiness of aircraft cockpit windows knowing that they were not authorized by the FAA to certify their airworthiness.  The investigation revealed that from approximately August 2009 to August 2010, ATR's employees continued repairing aircraft cockpit windows despite ATR having had its repair station certificate revoked.  As part of the scheme, ATR/TEG purchased "as removed" aircraft cockpit windows in the open market and backdated documents, to make it appear that the windows were from ATR or TEG's inventory prior to the repair station certificate revocation.  Additionally, serial numbers on the windows that had been sent to ATR by customers were changed to disguise the source of the windows and to further make it appear that all work had been performed prior to the repair station revocation.

This investigation is being worked jointly with the Department of Labor, Office of Inspector General; the Federal Bureau of Investigation; and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, with substantial assistance from the Federal Aviation Administration.