According to this Law360 post (subscription required), James Larrison, a former employee of Aegis Electronic Group, was sentenced to probation for his role in the company’s export of an EAR99 Hitachi JU72 video camera junction to Iran. Larrison pleaded guilty to the export violation in December 2009. In April 2011, Aegis entered into a deferred prosecution agreement and agreed to pay a $20,000 fine to the Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”) in connection with this export.

Aegis and Larrison came under investigation when information relating to them was found on the laptop seized by the government from Amir Ardebili, an Iranian procurement agent. Ardebili was lured by federal agents from Iran into the former Soviet Republic of Georgia where he was arrested, whisked away to the U.S., and thrown into solitary confinement to keep him quiet while agents pursued leads they found on his laptop. This blog wrote about the Ardebili case here, here and here.

Larrison was given probation because he cooperated against his former employer and provided the government prosecutors and investigators information about the complete absence of an export compliance program at Aegis. Readers of this blog may well recall a post from a few months ago where Aegis patted itself on its back, and even gave itself a gold seal, when the company registered with the Directorate of Defense Trade Controls under part 122 of the International Traffic in Arms Regulations.

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