Ex-Qantas executive to plead guilty to price-fixing plot: US

A former senior Qantas Airways executive has agreed to plead guilty for participating in a price-fixing conspiracy in international air cargo shipments, the US Justice Department said Thursday.

Bruce McCaffrey, who was the Australian flag carrier's top cargo executive in the United States, is the first individual to be charged in a wide-ranging US federal probe of price fixing in international passenger and cargo traffic, the department said in a statement.

According to the charges filed in US District Court in Washington, the former Qantas vice president of freight for the Americas and his co-conspirators plotted to fix rates on air cargo shipments charged to US and international customers, from at least as early as January 2000 and continuing until at least February 2006.

Under the plea bargain, which is subject to court approval, McCaffrey has agreed to pay a 20,000-dollar criminal fine for his violation of US antitrust law and to cooperate with the department's ongoing investigation.

McCaffrey also would serve eight months in jail.

The price-fixing charge carries a maximum fine of one million dollars, which can be increased under special circumstances, and up to 10 years in prison for an individual.

"Today's guilty plea demonstrates that our ongoing investigation into the air transportation industry will hold individuals, as well as corporations, responsible for engaging in criminal conduct," said Thomas Barnett, assistant US attorney general in charge of the department's antitrust division.

Barnett said the department remains dedicated to "aggressively pursuing those who conspire to cheat American businesses and consumers with price-fixing schemes."

McCaffrey is the fifth case to arise in the department's investigation into the air transportation industry, the department said.

In April, Japan Airlines agreed to plead guilty and on Wednesday was sentenced to pay a 110-million-dollar criminal fine for its role in a conspiracy to fix rates for international cargo shipments.

McCaffrey's former employer, Qantas, pleaded guilty in January and was sentenced to pay a 61-million-dollar criminal fine for engaging in a conspiracy to fix rates to customers in the United States and elsewhere for international air shipments.

In August 2007, British Airways and Korean Air Lines pleaded guilty and were each sentenced to pay separate 300-million-dollar criminal fines for their involvement in price-fixing conspiracies in passenger and cargo air transport.

Two other airlines, Virgin Atlantic of Britain and Lufthansa of Germany, are cooperating with the ongoing US investigation. Virgin Atlantic blew the whistle on British Airways in 2006 by informing British authorities about the illegal price-fixing scheme.

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