How ‘Fat Leonard’ bribed the US Navy to get diplomatic immunity to smuggle cargo, bring armed Gurkhas into Philippines
Leonard Glenn Francis’ company, Glenn Defence Marine Asia, held contracts worth hundreds of millions of dollars to resupply and refuel US Navy vessels in Asia
“Fat Leonard” ran a lot of corrupt schemes with the help of the US Navy, but one of the strangest may be the time he was granted US diplomatic immunity.
For more than a year, the Singapore-based defence contractor bribed the naval attache at the US Embassy in Manila to enable his firm to smuggle maritime cargo into the Philippines under US diplomatic cover, according to federal court records.
The illicit deal granted the contractor, whose real name is Leonard Glenn Francis, diplomatic clearance for his ships to visit Philippine ports without being subject to inspections, custom duties or taxes from local authorities, the records show.
US federal prosecutors said Francis exploited his diplomatic protection to bring armed Nepali soldiers - known as Gurkhas - into Philippine waters to serve as private security guards. At one point, Francis employed about 30 Gurkhas to deter pirates in Southeast Asia, according to two former business associates.
The unusual arrangement is revealed in a plea deal between the Justice Department and the naval attache, Michael George Brooks, a Navy captain who was assigned to the US Embassy in Manila between 2006 and 2008. He has since retired.
On Friday, Brooks, 59, was sentenced to 41 months in prison by US District Judge Janis Sammartino during a hearing in federal court in San Diego.