An Acworth business executive pleaded guilty in federal court Thursday to taking payoffs to steer business to one of his company's vendors, according to federal officials. He will pay $298,000 in restitution.
John Costa, 54, was president of a subsidiary of Interface Inc., one of the U.S.'s largest modular carpet makers. He was responsible for overseeing sales, project management and subcontracting of carpet installations for Interface customers.
From April 2005 through September 2007, Costa and the owner of a carpet installation company schemed to defraud Interface, according to officials. Costa awarded Interface's carpet installation work to the installation company in exchange for a percentage of the company’s profits, according to U.S. Attorney Sally Quillian Yates.
“This type of corruption hurts the honest operators of American businesses and their customers, as well as competing vendors who play by the rules,” Yates said.
The scheme later expanded, federal officials said.
Costa had the installation company to pay his wife a salary, even though she was not employed by and did not perform any work for the company, federal officials said. They added that Costa also had the installation company pay credit card expenses for his wife and make Individual Retirement Account (IRA) contributions in his wife's name.
In a plea agreement, Costa agreed to pay $298,160 in restitution to Interface Inc. , according to Yates. Ray C. Anderson founded Interface in 1973 in LaGrange.
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