Broker Pleads Guilty to Parts Laundering
The owner and operator of Shelby Enterprises of Suffern, N.Y.

The owner and operator of Shelby Enterprises of Suffern, N.Y. has entered a guilty plea in U.S. District Court in connection with an aircraft parts laundering scheme involving the sale of approximately $3 million in scrapped jet engine parts, according to U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman. Fishman said that from April 2005 to August 2009 Carmine Coviello used Shelby Enterprises to purchase used jet engine blades and vanes from scrap metal dealers and had them grit-blasted and blended at a metal shop to conceal that the parts had been scrapped. In some cases, read the ­indictment, the parts had already been deemed non-repairable and therefore not airworthy by FAA-certified repair stations. It was charged that Coviello then sold the illegally repaired blades and vanes to Tara Aviation of Ridgefield, N.J. The sales, “in the approximate amount of $3 million, occurred only on paper. The parts never changed hands.” Coviello faces a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison and a fine of $250,000 or twice the gross gain or loss caused by his offense, whichever is greater.