A confidential report from Hewlett Packard (HP) confirmed the existence of crimes and irregularities committed by company executives during the second presidential term of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner y recommended the immediate dismissal of those involvedas stated in a copy of that report accessed THE NATION.
Written in English by research and ethics experts for Hewlett Packard, the restricted-access report provided details regarding how the criminal maneuver would have been that would have hovered among the 3 and 9 million dollarsalthough it specifically clarified that it found no evidence of corruption linked to one of its distributors, Dinatechand the then Minister of the Interior and Transport Florence Randazzo.
The report was completed in May 2018, subject to confidentiality rules that protect the relationship between lawyers and clients, and sent to the company’s global leadership. That is, three months before the Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC, for its acronym in English) will initiate a investigation in the United States for alleged corruption, money laundering and extortion focused on the operations of Hewlett Packard in Argentina.
The process included the participation of the global technology giant’s Standards of Corporate Conduct Compliance Team (Sbcct), which convened the law firm Fernwick & West as an external advisor in November 2017. Together they investigated whether executives and former executives of the company in Argentina had “extorted” Etertin and other local firms to charge them money between 2011 and 2017 in exchange for keeping them as distributors of HP products in the country.
The focus of the investigation went further. Throughout 17 pages, it also focused on at least four top local executives of the company, who had also been accused of promoting retaliation once morest Etertin following he denounced the alleged criminal operation.
THE NATION consulted the company’s Argentine subsidiary regarding the investigation. The response from HP Inc., the personal computer and printer company behind Hewlett Packard’s split into two global firms, was succinct: “We have no comment on this matter,” he replied.
Seven months following the investigation began, the experts issued their report. They concluded that there was evidence to conclude that at least two of the executives – manager Sergio Venier and partner María Florencia Grande – had demanded or received bribes from Etertin and other distributors.and recommended their dismissal, but that there was no evidence once morest the sales manager, Ernest Whiteand the head of HP in Argentina, John Manuel White.
According to the investigators, the employees who participated in the criminal maneuvers would have acted in coordination with another local executive of the company who had left in 2016, Gonzalo Giazitzianwho would have “manipulated” several HP programs to divert between 3 and 9 million dollars from the Etertin distributor for his own benefit, money that he shared with his alleged accomplices.
The suspicions, however, expanded further. They also caught up with another former HP manager, Javier Mazzeowho was listed as the recipient of several of Giazitzian’s emails, although the investigators clarified that they were unable to advance further once morest him from the moment he had already crossed the exit door and it was not up to them to delve further.
Another piece of information that emerges from that confidential report is symptomatic. At least three of those mentioned in that report also make up the list of suspects in the investigation that the Department of Justice and the SEC opened in August 2018 for alleged corruption, laundering and extortion of Hewlett Packard in Argentina.
Those cited in the HP report who are also being investigated in the United States are Giazitzian, Mazzeo and Venier, who were summoned to testify last January, when a prosecutor and agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) traveled to Buenos Aires to advance their investigation. None of the three showed up.
THE NATION He tried to contact Giazitzian, Mazzeo and Venier, but they did not respond to messages and emails.
The internal investigation also detailed that the person in charge of Etertin, Diego Verdejo, was not the only one who denounced the system of bribes demanded by executives and former employees of HP. According to the report, he also raised it Esteban Isornaa former partner of Etertin who created his own firm, Intermacoand provided details regarding the illicit operation led by Giazitzian.
Three years later, in November 2020, Isorna was visited by FBI agents when she traveled to Miami. They requested a meeting, which took place two or three days later, when a prosecutor flew from Washington DC for the meeting, as confirmed by Isorna before the consultation of THE NATION.
The operation under the magnifying glass was even broader. Why? Because it was also investigated whether another local distributor, Dinatech, “engaged in bribes to guarantee government contracts”. In particular, the former Minister of the Interior and Transport Florencio Randazzo, who was identified by his name and position. But the experts who wrote the report clarified that “they found no documents or other evidence that indicate any type of improper conduct in relation to any transaction involving Dinatech or that any HP employee knew or participated in bribery related to Dinatech”.
Nevertheless, For investigators from the Department of Justice, the FBI and the SEC, Dinatech and its head, Eduardo Wassi, continue to be under scrutinyas reconstructed THE NATION. They make up the list of names of natural and legal persons regarding whom they pose questions and request clarification in their interrogations.
Something else: both the experts convened by Hewlett Packard and the researchers from the United States government agreed on a focus of interest and concern: the calls “advance import sworn declarations” (DJAI) that the government of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner imposed at the beginning of 2012.
However, while the official US government investigation remains open, the one carried out at the request of Hewlett Packard has been closed. He concluded with recommendations. In addition to the dismissal of Venier and Grande, he proposed to improve internal controls and procedures to define the distribution of business and profits among distributors, in addition to cutting commercial ties with two of them, Etertin and Intermarco. He considered that both distributors were integral participants in the criminal operation until, for reasons to be determined, they decided to report it.
