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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowA Carmel man who leads a local IT consulting and staffing company has been indicted for allegedly participating in a bribery and kickback scheme with an accomplice who worked for a national health care charity based in New Jersey.
Dilip Vadlamudi, president and co-founder of Indianapolis-based Pyramid Technology Solutions Inc., and Nimesh Patel, former senior director of the information technology group at the national headquarters of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society in Westchester, New Jersey, have been charged with conspiracy to commit wire fraud and money laundering.
The pair was indicted last month in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, New York, after a grand jury investigation.
“As alleged, the defendants conspired to defraud a national nonprofit organization,” U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara of the Southern District of New York said in a written statement. “Patel allegedly abused his position at the nonprofit to funnel millions in fees to Vadlamudi’s company in exchange for hundreds of thousands in kickbacks. Thanks to the investigative work of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the defendants’ alleged fraud scheme has been put to an end.”
Both men face three counts: one count each of conspiracy to commit honest services wire fraud; conspiring to violate the Travel Act; and conspiring to commit money laundering.
The wire fraud and money laundering counts each carry a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. The Travel Act count carries a maximum sentence of five years.
Both men were arrested last month and released on bond of $250,000. Both entered preliminary pleas of not guilty.
Vadlamudi ‘s attorney, Sharon Louise McCarthy, did not respond to a request for comment on the case.
According to the indictment, Patel, 45, used his position at the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society to hire workers from Vadlamudi’s firm. The society paid Vadlamudi’s company about $2.2 million for about 36 temporary IT workers from 2012 to 2014.
In return for the business, Vadlamudi, 45, funneled $274,000 in illegal kickbacks to Patel, the indictment alleges. Investigators say Vadlamudi made the payments from the bank account of an unnamed company he owns into an account of a shell company set up by Patel.
Patel used those funds to make an $80,000 downpayment on a residence, buy a life insurance policy and pay credit card bills, according to the indictment.
When the not-for-profit launched a probe into Patel’s activities in late 2014, he told investigators that he barely knew Vadlamudi and had little contact with him.
Investigators said they later uncovered nearly 800 emails the two exchanged from 2009 to 2014.
Pyramid Technology Solutions, 9535 E 59th St., was founded in 1998 and offers numerous IT-related services, including consulting, cloud and enterprise solutions, and temporary and permanent staffing. The firm reported revenue of $28 million in 2015.
The company is the 14th largest minority-owned business in the area, with 64 local full-time employees, according to IBJ research. Pyramid Technology said 90 percent of its local employees are minorities.
It ranked as the area's fourth-largest area employment agency in 2015, with 51 fulltime employment counselors; and as the 15th largest woman-owned business based on employment.
Owners are listed as Lavanya Kantamaneni and Lalitha Vadlamudi.
The firm also has offices in Chicago, Los Angeles and New York, and development centers in Hyderabad and Vijayawada, India.
A 2014 story by The Indianapolis Star said Pyramid Technology had 170 workers companywide, with about 75 percent of them working under the H-1B visa program.
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