The US Department of Justice said Toru Otoda, who was a general manager in K-Line’s car carrier division, had plead guilty to price fixing and had been jailed for 18 months and fined $20,000.
The charge related to price fixing in the Port of Baltimore between November 2010 and September 2012.
“Today’s sentence reinforces our commitment to hold executives accountable for colluding to fix ocean freight prices,” said Assistant Attorney General Bill Baer of the Department of Justice’s Antitrust Division. “This investigation will continue as we seek to prosecute the executives who conspired and the companies that employed them.”
Otoda is the third K Line executive to be jailed for price fixing in the US, and the fourth overall in the Department of Justice’s investigation into ocean transportation.
In November 2014 K Line was ordered to pay a fine of $67.7m for price fixing.
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