Federal prosecutors filed charges against a former D.C. government building official for allegedly trying to bribe one of his former co-workers.
Former D.C. Department of Consumer and Regulatory Affairs Engineer Yaw Agipong was accused of trying to pay off a construction inspector to lift a stop work order and reduce a $6,000 fine on a project in the 1100 block of Fifth Street Northwest, according to charges filed Friday in U.S. District Court.
Prosecutors accused Agipong of offering the inspector $2,000 last fall.
Authorities have not arrested Agipong, but they have scheduled a federal court hearing in March. Agipong faces 15 years in prison. He refused to talk to The Examiner Thursday.
Agipong worked for the DCRA from 1982 before retiring in 2005. A DCRA spokesman said he could not comment because the entire matter remains under investigation.
Developers of the Fifth Street property, Todd Zirkle, Vanessa Humphreys and her husband, FBI agent Kevin Humphreys, last year accused Agipong and the head of the construction inspection unit, Juan Scott, of conspiring to extort them out of thousands of dollars.
The FBI began taping Zirkle’s and Vanessa Humphreys’ conversations with Agipong, according to an affidavit signed by the developers.
Agipong told Zirkle that the developers could make their problems disappear if they paid $20,000, according to the affidavit. Zirkle was wired when he met Agipong in a warehouse with $17,000 in cash and $3,000 check addressed to the DCRA, accordingto the affidavit.
The FBI took Agipong into custody but did not arrest him at the time.
A subsequent Examiner investigation found that before he joined the DCRA, Scott served four years in federal prison after he and his cousin, a D.C. police officer, were arrested in 1986 and charged with possession of $100,000 worth of cocaine, 17 rifles, 400 rounds of ammunition and a live hand grenade.
DCRA officials have since taken away Scott’s law enforcement badge and his inspection authorities while the investigation is under way, a spokesman said.
