The State Department Directorate of Defense Controls posted on Dec. 5 a snapshot of major U.S. export enforcement, economic espionage, trade secret and embargo-related criminal cases handled by the Justice Department since January 2008. The document was last updated on Nov. 20. The cases are the result of investigations by the Homeland Security Investigations, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security, the Pentagon’s Defense Criminal Investigative Service and other law enforcement agencies. The snapshot is not exhaustive, said Justice.

A New York antiques dealer was sentenced to 37 months in prison for his role in a conspiracy to smuggle artifacts made from rhinoceros horns and ivory in violation of wildlife trafficking laws, announced the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York on Dec. 5. Qiang Wang, aka Jeffery Wang, pleaded guilty in August to charges that he conspired with others to export libation cups carved from rhinoceros horns to Hong Kong and China, without declaring them to CBP or the Fish and Wildlife Service (see 13080914).

The Court of International Trade on Dec. 4 remanded the final results of the 2009-10 antidumping duty administrative review on circular welded non-alloy steel pipe from South Korea (A-580-809) for the Commerce Department to reconsider the way it priced inputs used by respondent SeAH in steel production.

A New York drug importer has filed suit against the Food and Drug Administration in a bid to secure release of a shipment of raw pharmaceutical ingredients that was refused by the agency. H&M USA filed a complaint Nov. 19 at the Eastern New York U.S. District Court, arguing FDA cited a non-existent policy on labeling of bulk active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) to refuse entry. The company wants the district court to order the shipment’s release, and block a CBP redelivery order.

Oil services company Weatherford International will pay $252 million to settle charges that it violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and the International Emergency Economic Powers Act export control provisions, said the Justice Department Nov. 26. The company will resolve charges that it didn’t have adequate internal controls, which resulted in bribery and corruption by its subsidiaries. The Office of Foreign Assets Controls announced its settlement with the company on Nov. 26 (see 13112631).

Two more auto parts manufacturers agreed to plead guilty to charges that they conspired to fix prices of auto parts. In separate cases, Toyo Tire & Rubber agreed on Nov. 26 to pay $120 million to settle its charges (here), and Stanley Electric Co. Ltd. agreed on Nov. 27 to pay $1.44 million (here). The two settlements are part of the larger Justice Department investigation that has so far resulted in over $1.8 billion in criminal fines and prison time for 20 company executives for price fixing in the auto parts industry.

Thousands of small freight brokerage companies might have to shut down Dec. 1 due to the "Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century" Act, according to an appeal filed by the Association of Independent Property Brokers & Agents (AIPBA) in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. It said one provision of the 600-page transportation bill, Section 32918, requires the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration to raise the bond requirement for freight brokers from $10,000 to at least $75,000. FMCSA issued a new rule Oct. 1 to implement the provision, without public participation, AIPBA said. The appeal said FMCSA's manner of enforcing the new bond amount was done improperly, and FMCSA should have to go through proper rulemaking and fact-finding before FMCSA enforces a new bond amount.

The Court of International Trade ordered the Commerce Department to rethink the 308.33% antidumping duty rate assigned to Blue Field in the 2010-11 administrative review of preserved mushrooms from China (A-570-851). Blue Field said the unusually high AD duty rate, which was calculated from data and not assigned as punishment, was skewed by the agency’s valuation of its rice straw and cow manure inputs. The high “surrogate values,” used because Commerce doesn’t trust Chinese input prices, drove up the agency’s estimate of Blue Field’s domestic prices, which resulted in the company’s U.S. prices looking extremely cheap (and dumped) by comparison. Blue Field pointed out that the Colombian rice straw prices used by Commerce were higher than Colombian prices for actual rice, and that the Colombian fertilizer prices used by Commerce were not specific to cow manure, and approached the price of hamburger meat. The court agreed that something was fishy with Commerce’s numbers, and remanded for agency reconsideration.

The Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit announced higher new fee rates under the Judicial Conference of the United States’ miscellaneous fee schedule, effective Dec. 1. Changes include a $50 increase in the filing fee, and higher fees for record reproduction, record retrieval, and archive requests. The updated schedule includes a new $39 fee for archive requests involving multiple boxes. Higher fees will be required for certification of documents, and the return check fee will also rise.

Two more Japanese executives were indicted for their alleged roles in a conspiracy to fix the price of auto parts, said the Justice Department. A Northern Ohio U.S. District Court grand jury indicted Masao Hayashi and Kenya Nonoyama Nov. 20 for colluding to fix the price of anti-vibration rubber parts sold to Toyota and used to manufacture cars in the U.S., in violation of the Sherman Act. The executives each face a maximum of 10 years in prison and a fine of $1 million if found guilty. The indictment is part of a wide-ranging Justice Department investigation on price fixing of automotive parts, DOJ said. To date, 21 companies and 26 executives have been charged, including Hayashi and Nonoyama. The charges have resulted in $1.6 million in fines and 17 of the charged executives spending time in prison, said DOJ.