A Department of Veterans Affairs contracting officer accepted nearly $1.3 million in kickbacks to steer construction work to a company falsely claiming a bidding preference reserved for service-disabled veterans, court records show.

Jarod Machinga, a supervisory engineer at the veterans hospital in East Orange, N.J., took the payoffs over a five-year period in which he directed about $6.8 million of work to the company. Machinga pleaded guilty this week to multiple fraud charges.