Atlanta, GA - Daytona Beach's deputy utilities director is now facing charges related to bribery and tax evasion, according to a report from the United States Department of Justice in Atlanta.
The DOJ announced on Friday (June 19th) that Jo Ann Macrina, who served as Atlanta's Department of Watershed Management Commissioner, accepted "money and other items of value" from a city and county contractor by the name of Lohrasb "Jeff" Jafari.
According to the DOJ, Jafari was already charged in a 51 count indictment that also includes bribery and tax evasion, on top of tampering with a witness, money laundering and structuring in 2019.
He was separately charged with an additional county of bribery and tampering with a witness in connection to the bribes he reportedly paid to Macrina.
“Macrina allegedly decided that accepting bribes from Jafari was more important than following the rules established for contracting by the City of Atlanta – and thereby betrayed the public’s trust,” said U.S. Attorney Byung J. “BJay” Pak in the DOJ's release. “In exchange for those bribe payments, Macrina manipulated the evaluation process to direct work to Jafari’s firm.”
Chris Hacker, Special Agent in Charge of FBI Atlanta, stated in that same release that circumventing the process to hire contractors by accepting bribes is the "highest form of public corruption."
"Macrina undermined the process of fair and open competition when she accepted bribes from a contractor in exchange for money and other things of value," said James Dorsey, Special Agent in Charge, IRS Criminal Investigation. "In addition, Macrina failed to report bribes and income on her income tax returns."
According to Pak, Macrina served as the Department of Watershed Management commissioner between April 2011 and May of 2016. During her time with Atlanta, the city awarded contracts worth millions of dollars to PRAD Group Inc., an Atlanta-based architectural, design, and construction management and services firm that Jafari was the executive vice president of.
Between 2014 and 2016, the USDOJ reports that Macrina met with Jafari with other people, including Atlanta's former Chief Procurement Officer, Adam Smith, to discuss procurement projects, bids and solicitations. During those meetings, Jafari was allegedly seeking contracts and work with the City of Atlanta.
In late 2014, the Department of Justice says evaluators from multiple city departments met to discuss proposals that the city requested regarding an architectural, engineering and design services contact. The DOJ reports that JP2, a joint venture that was led by PRAD Group, ranked near the bottom of their choices. Macrina and others conducted interviews with the firms to reevaluate the proposals "in an effort to alter their final scores."
According to the release, Macrina replaced two evaluators that represented the Department of Watershed Management with herself and another individual to ensure that certain firms were selected.
JP2 was chosen as one of the six vendors a year later. In 2016, Macrina issued two notices that contracted JP2 for work with her department. The first order was valued at over $9 million, while the other was valued at over $2 million.
It was also during that time that Macrina reportedly discussed potential employment with Jafari and allegedly accepted items in exchange for providing him with access to information and preferential treatment with respect to city projects.
Per the release, Macrina allegedly accepted $10,000 in cash, jewelry, a room at a luxury Dubai hotel and landscaping work from Jafari or through an employee of PRAD.
Shortly after her employment with the city ended in May of 2016, Macrina began working PRAD Group. Between June and September of that same year, the report suggests that Jafari and/or PRAD Group paid her $30,000 in four separate payments, which was not reported on her 2016 income tax return.
