Another sent to prison in aircraft repair fraud

•  Former operations manager of Weco repair station sentenced
•  Guilty of recklessly endangering aircraft

The former operations manager of Weco Aerospace Systems Inc. has been sentenced for conspiracy to destroy aircraft or aircraft facilities, according to U.S. Attorney Benjamin Wagner.

U.S. District Judge John Mendez sentenced Jerry Edward Kuwata, 64, of Granite Bay, to one year in prison.

Weco was a Federal Aviation Administration-certified repair business with facilities in Lincoln and Burbank. According to court documents, the company was permitted by the FAA to repair certain types of aircraft parts, including starter generators and converters, used on various types of aircraft, including small helicopters used by tour companies and law enforcement agencies.

But Weco employees regularly failed to follow FAA regulations in repairing and overhauling the aircraft parts and in many cases, Weco did not even have equipment capable of performing required tests.

Weco workers at both locations nonetheless performed repairs and returned parts to customers, falsely certifying that the parts had passed tests and had been repaired in accordance FAA standards, the court documents say.

There have been no known instances in which a fraudulent Weco repair resulted in an aircraft accident. However, Weco customers who testified at the trial of Weco’s owner, William Hugh Weygandt, 65, of Granite Bay, consistently testified that once they learned of the fraudulent repairs, they removed all Weco-repaired parts from their aircraft due to safety concerns.

At sentencing, Judge Mendez noted that Mr. Kuwata never took action to notify the FAA of the fraud, and expressed concern for the potential safety risks posed by such conduct.

A federal jury found Mr. Weygandt guilty of conspiracy to commit fraud involving aircraft parts repair. He was sentenced on July 8, 2014, to two and half years in prison. Other former Weco executives Michael Dennis Maupin, of Arbuckle and Anthony Vincent Zito, of Saugus, previously pleaded guilty to federal offenses in connection with the conspiracy and await sentencing.

Original article can be found here: http://www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com