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Ex-Home Depot Worker Sentenced In Kickback Scheme

The Associated Press

ATLANTA (AP) — A former Home Depot flooring buyer was sentenced Thursday to 6½ years in federal prison for overseeing a scheme in which foreign vendors paid millions in kickbacks to recieve lucrative contracts to supply the chain.

Anthony Tesvich agreed to pay $8.2 million in restitution for the scheme, which led to the convictions of two other former Home Depot employees and his ex-wife. Tesvich must also forfeit assets he obtained through the fraud, including properties in suburban Atlanta, Desert Hot Springs, Calif., and Mobile, Ala.

He apologized before U.S. District Judge Richard Story handed down the sentence.

"I wish I could turn back the hands of time, but I cannot," Tesvich said.

U.S. Attorney David Nahmias said Tesvich masterminded the kickback scheme that hurt Home Depot, its suppliers who played by the rules and its customers.

"This defendant and his co-conspirators inside Home Depot took payoffs from certain foreign vendors in exchange for giving those suppliers' products and unfair advantage in the company's many stores across the country," Nahmias said.

Federal sentencing guidelines recommended a prison term of at least 10 years before Story gave Tesvich credit for his assistance to federal authorities.

He pleaded guilty last year to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and three counts of tax evasion.

Prosecutors said Tesvich evaded taxes on illicit income totaling $1.5 million from 2003 through 2005.

Tesvich continued serving the foreign vendors even after he left Home Depot, giving substantial cash payments to his co-conspirators still with the company. The payoffs totaled more than $2.5 million, and one co-conspirator got a luxury SUV from Tesvich, prosecutors said.