Three men arraigned in alleged IT kickback scheme

Three Boston-area men have been arraigned in connection with allegedly setting up kickbacks from a vendor in exchange for securing computer software and service contracts for Partners Healthcare.

According to the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office, investigators discovered that between July 2003 and October 2007, Brian Colpak, owner of enterprise technology reseller Future Technologies, allegedly paid two men thousands of dollars for their help in obtaining contracts to provide IT systems and service for Partners and its entities, which include the Dana Farber Cancer Institute.

Before vendors can do business with Partners, they must complete a vendor application, and the winning bid is selected and must be approved by the department’s supervisor. The guidelines stipulate that the vendor cannot provide any members of Partners with rewards, gratuities or gifts.

Co-defendant John Dimille was a group leader in the production division of the information systems department at Partners, and had a great deal of control as to who was awarded the contract for the acquisition, installation and maintenance of these particular systems. As master engineer in Dimille’s division, co-defendent John Cleary played a major role in reviewing the contracts for these systems.

Authorities allege that Dimille and Cleary often would not solicit competing bids for contracts, or failed to engage other interested parties, before awarding Colpak the winning bid.

Colpak pleaded innocent in Suffolk Superior Court to four counts of commercial bribery and one count of conspiracy to commit commercial bribery. Dimille pleaded innocent to commercial bribery and conspiracy to commit commercial bribery. Cleary was charged with two counts of commercial bribery.

According to Future Technologies’ website, the company helped move Dana Farber to a large-scale data center based on two large Sun servers. The company claimed the cancer center saved $1 million a year.

Also, interesting to note: try Googling “John Dimille” and then click on the Future Technologies “Testimonials” page (for me, it’s the fifth result). Compare the cached version with the current version of the page — notice anybody missing?

Thanks to Universal Hub for the heads up.