The United States Department of Justice has moved a New York federal court to dismiss the criminal indictment against Gautam S Adani, Sagar R Adani and six others. (USA Vs Gautam Adani & ors)
The motion was filed before Judge Nicholas G Garaufis of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York.
In its May 18 filing, the US government said that the Department of Justice had reviewed the case and decided, in its prosecutorial discretion, not to devote further resources to the criminal charges against the individual defendants.
“The government respectfully submits this motion, pursuant to Federal Rule of Criminal Procedure 48(a), requesting that the Court dismiss the indictment in this case with prejudice,” the filing stated.
The DOJ also told the Court that no defendant had appeared in the case and that counsel for all defendants had consented to the relief sought.
The motion was submitted by Trent McCotter, Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General, and Joseph Nocella Jr, United States Attorney. The dismissal is pending final court approval.
Separately, last week the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) also proposed civil monetary penalties of $18 million against Gautam Adani and Sagar Adani in a case concerning false and misleading statements made in connection with a 2021 bond offering by Adani Green Energy Limited.
Gautam Adani, Sagar Adani, and Vneet Jaain are represented in the proceedings by Robert J Giuffra Jr and James McDonald. Incidentally, Robert Guffra happens to be US President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer.
Giuffra Jr is co-chair of Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, along with Scott D Miller.
The other lawyers who represented Adani are Timothy Sini (Nixon Peabody) and Andrey Spektor (Norton Rose Fulbright).
The other defendants were represented as follows:
Ranjit Gupta: Paul Schoeman of HSF Kramer (New York).
Cyril Cabanes was represented by Stephen Best from Brown Rudnick (Washington, DC).
Saurabh Agarwal was represented by Winston Paes of Debevoise & Plimpton (New York).
Deepak Malhotra was represented by Aditya Singh (Singapore) and Michael Kendall (Boston) of White & Case.
Rupesh Agarwal was represented by Iris Bennett and Patrick Linehan of Steptoe (Washington, DC).
The case arose from allegations that Gautam Adani and others were involved in a bribery scheme linked to a 12 gigawatt solar power project.
According to the earlier indictment, the Solar Energy Corporation of India needed state electricity distribution companies to enter into Power Supply Agreements so that the project and related Power Purchase Agreements would be financially workable.
The indictment had alleged that bribes worth ₹2,029 crore, around $265 million, were promised to officials of Indian state electricity distribution companies.
Of this, ₹1,750 crore was allegedly allocated to officials in Andhra Pradesh to secure purchase of 7 gigawatts of solar power.
It was also alleged that Adani entities raised over $3 billion in loans and securities from US investors while concealing the alleged bribery scheme. The indictment had further claimed that Adani issued $750 million in senior secured notes in September 2021, with around 25% purchased by US-based investors.
[Read DOJ Filing]
[Read Draft Order]
[Read Gautam Adani's SEC Consent]