A Fort Pierce biofuel executive will spend the next year and a half in federal prison after a scheme to invent fake green energy credits caught up with him. Christopher Burdett, the owner of a Florida-based renewable fuel company, was sentenced today to 18 months behind bars followed by two years of supervised release.
On top of the prison time, a federal judge ordered Burdett to pay a heavy financial penalty, including $2,857,029 in restitution and a $150,000 fine.
Burdett’s company claimed to process raw feedstocks into usable biodiesel. Under federal programs, producing actual biofuel generates lucrative EPA renewable fuel credits and IRS tax credits. According to court records, Burdett and his general manager, Royce Gillham, realized they could make far more money by simply fabricating their manufacturing numbers on paper.
The duo vastly overstated how much biodiesel they were actually making. In total, the accounting trick generated more than $7 million in fraudulent EPA credits and attempted to secure over $6 million in fake tax credits. When federal auditors grew suspicious and started asking questions, Burdett and Gillham doubled down on the lie, providing investigators with falsified information about their production volumes and fake customer lists.
The strategy ultimately fell apart under scrutiny from the EPA’s Criminal Investigation Division and IRS Criminal Investigation’s Florida Field Office. Burdett eventually cut a deal, pleading guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and filing false claims. Gillham, his general manager, was previously sentenced to 37 months in prison for his own role in the operation.
Government officials noted that the prosecution fits into a broader crackdown on financial fraud. The case was handled by Senior Trial Attorney Adam Cullman of the Justice Department’s Environmental Crimes Section and Assistant U.S. Attorney Daniel Funk for the Southern District of Florida. The sentencing comes shortly after the Department of Justice launched its new National Fraud Enforcement Division on April 7, an initiative aimed at cutting down on fraud, waste, and abuse across federal programs.
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