DALLAS — Former Maverick County Commissioner Cesar Flores, one of 17 people convicted in a sweeping bribery investigation in the county, has been sentenced to 10 years in federal prison.
Flores is one of two Maverick County commissioners convicted in the scheme. Former commissioner Rudy Heredia was also sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Heredia and Flores were part of a scheme involving a multimillion-dollar grant fund from the Texas Department of Transportation to improve roads and drainage in the county's poor, unincorporated colonias, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office in San Antonio.
Contractors inflated bids and kicked back a portion of the profits to commissioners, according to federal documents. Other times, they accepted payment for work that was never done.
Acting United States Attorney Richard L. Durbin Jr. compared the scheme to "a cancer on the body politic, eating away public confidence in local government.
"We will make every effort to counter its effects and hold accountable those who abuse the public trust for their personal gain," Durbin said after Flores was sentenced Feb. 25.
Flores admitted that he agreed to take bribes to ensure that certain Eagle Pass contractors, including Javier Gonzales, Hipolito Amaya and Roberto Lopez Macias, were awarded construction contracts in Maverick County in 2010 and in 2011.
Others convicted in the scheme include Alejandra Garcia, former deputy auditor who received 109 months in federal prison.
Marcelo Alvarez, a surveyor and consultant who bribed county officials to ensure that an engineering company that hired him received contracts, was sentenced to 112 months.
Salvador Castillon, the owner of South Texas Concrete, was sentenced to 87 months in prison. Castillon received $416,000 in contracts from Maverick County.
"These defendants created a culture of corruption that spread throughout Maverick County, enabling theft and waste to thrive while taxpayers and honest businesses suffered," FBI agent Christopher Combs said.
Authorities are still looking for two defendants, San Antonio businessman German Garcia Cano and Eagle Pass businessman Alejandro Wheeler.
Cano, owner of GGC Enterprises, failed to appear for sentencing in February. Wheeler, owner and operator of TVAW Ch. 20, a now defunct media outlet based in Eagle Pass, has been a fugitive since being indicted by a federal grand jury in November 2013.
In October, Cano pleaded guilty to one count of paying a bribe. According to court records, Maverick County paid GGC hundreds of thousands of dollars between 2009 and 2012 for leasing heavy equipment used in construction projects throughout the County.
Cano admitted to paying bribes to two Maverick County employees to ensure that GGC secured those leasing contracts with Maverick County and to receive his checks from the County.
Wheeler is charged with one count of aiding and abetting paying a bribe to an agent of an organization receiving federal funds and one count of aiding and abetting theft concerning programs receiving federal funds.
With its county seat in Eagle Pass, Maverick County borders the Rio Grande and has a population of about 55,000.
