KENNEWICK — The owner of a Hanford nuclear site subcontractor has agreed to pay the federal government $1.1 million to settle accusations that he and BNL Technical Services defrauded the federal government through its COVID loan program.
A plea agreement with the Eastern Washington District U.S. Attorney’s Office still must go before a federal judge. A hearing is scheduled Tuesday before U.S. Judge Stanley Bastian in the Yakima U.S. Courthouse.
BNL Technical Services, owned and operated by Wilson Pershing Stevenson, received nearly $494,000 in 2020 from a Paycheck Protection Program loan through the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security (CARES) Act.
The loan was to retain and maintain payroll for Hanford site workers and also few Department of Veterans Affairs workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.
But the federal government continued to cover the costs of those employees as part of a commitment to keep the federal government contracting workforce in a ready state during the pandemic, according to a court document. BNL overhead costs associated with the workers also were reimbursed with federal government funds.
BNL, which had an office in Richland, hired staff and deployed them to Hanford nuclear reservation and other federal contractors, a service called “staff augmentation.”
Hanford staff for which it received federal loans to pay wages were assigned to work for contractor Washington River Protection Solutions and former contractors Mission Support Alliance and CH2M Hill Plateau Remediation Co., according to court documents.
During the early part of the pandemic the number of workers reporting for environmental cleanup at the Hanford nuclear reservation was limited, with most workers telecommuting or paid with DOE money to wait for more work to resume.
The Hanford nuclear reservation in Eastern Washington adjacent to Richland was used to produce almost two-thirds of the plutonium for the nation’s nuclear weapons program, leaving massive environmental contamination on the 580-square-mile site.
COVID loan money spending
Within 48 hours of BNL receiving the loan at least $453,000 had been spent to pay off Stevenson’s personal and family debts, according to an indictment.
That included $100,000 transferred to Stevenson’s father and $48,600 to a family trust, according to court documents.
Much of the rest of the money was used to pay off credit card debt, according to the indictment.
The federal government later forgave the loan, which cleared it from having to be repaid.
BNL and Stevenson later applied for and received another Paycheck Protection Program loan of nearly $820,000.
Most of that loan, which also was forgiven, was used correctly for employees who were not assigned work on federal projects, according to new federal court documents.
But some of it also was used to pay off another federal loan, a $150,000 COVID Economic Injury Disaster Loan, which was not an approved use of the money, according to court documents.
In late August, Stevenson signed a settlement agreement with the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Spokane agreeing to pay just over $1.1 million to the federal government, which includes nearly $494,000 in BNL restitution and about $612,000 in addition.
“COVID-19 relief programs quickly ran out of money due to the number of people and businesses that request funding, which meant that some deserving small businesses were not able to obtain funding to keep their businesses in operation during the COVID-19 pandemic,” said U.S. Attorney Vanessa Waldref, when Stevenson and his company were accused of fraud related to the CARES Act.
The settlement agreement is not an admission of liability by Stevenson, according to the agreement.
BNL now is inactive in Washington and in Tennessee, where it also conducted business, according to a court document.
The prosecution and BNL also reached a plea agreement that would drop criminal charges other than a bank fraud charge against BNL.
