Civil Judgment Imposed Against former Pittsburgh Bridge Contractor
On September 30, 2014, a $50,000 civil judgment was imposed on Matthew Williams, the former owner of Clear Span Construction Products, LLC (Clear Span) by the U.S. District Court, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. A civil False Claims Act complaint was previously filed against Williams for submitting false claims for bridge-decking products supplied on federal highway projects.
Williams previously pleaded guilty to criminal charges and was sentenced for his role in the falsification of engineering documents related to Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) funded construction projects between July 2008 and April 2012. Clear Span manufactured stay-in-place metal bridge deck forms that were placed between either structural steel or pre-stressed concrete bridge girders.
Williams admitted that on multiple occasions and without authorization, he forged or affixed the seal and signature of unwitting project engineers on bridge plans and transmitted these engineering documents to prime contractors on the FHWA funded projects. The investigation revealed that Williams submitted over 500 falsified documents on more than 75 federal and state funded highway projects in 13 states.
We conducted this investigation with the Federal Bureau of Investigation, with assistance from the FHWA.