A second Schofield Barracks soldier has admitted stealing and selling thousands of gallons of jet fuel when he was deployed in Afghanistan earlier this year.
Sgt. Regionald O. Dixon pleaded guilty in U.S. District Court Wednesday to bribery. He faces maximum penalties of 15 years in prison and a $250,000 fine when he is sentenced in October. He must also pay restitution and will forfeit the $37,500 that federal agents seized from him in February and the $13,700 he tried to send out of the country by FedEx, which Homeland Security officials intercepted.
Dixon, 30, was assigned to A Company, 325th Brigade Support Battalion, at Forward Operating Base Fenty in Jalalabad, Afghanistan.
"I was a soldier in Afghanistan and I took money to steal fuel to sell it to the Afghanis," he said.
The U.S. military stockpiles fuel at Fenty for use on base and to transport to other forward operating bases in Afghanistan.
As a petroleum operator, Dixon transferred fuel from holding tanks to tanker trucks, transporting it to different parts of Fenty and fueling military aircraft, especially helicopters.
The government says Dixon, Spc. Larry Emmons, who pleaded guilty to bribery last week, and Emmons’ supervisor, an unnamed Army sergeant first class, stole at least 135,000 gallons of JP8 jet fuel in January and February and sold it to an Afghan military trucking contractor.
The contractor collected the fuel in 3,000-gallon tanker trucks and left Fenty with the fuel, using false authorization paperwork prepared by Emmons and his supervisor. The contractor paid the defendants $6,000 per truckload, the government says.
With a cost to the military of $4.25 per gallon, the government estimates the value of the stolen fuel at $573,750.
Federal prosecutors charged two other people in Colorado Tuesday with operating a similar scheme at Fenty in 2010. Christopher Weaver, who was a sergeant at Fort Carson, Colo., and Jonathan Hightower, a civilian employee of Texas-based contractor Fluor Inc., face bribery and theft conspiracy charges.
