DARMSTADT, Germany (AP) - Two former Siemens AG officials were convicted Monday of bribery and assisting bribery for their involvement in multimillion-dollar payments to officials at an Italian utility.
The verdict came in the first trial over a series of scandals at the German company.
The Darmstadt state court also ordered Siemens to forfeit $51.4 million in profits from deals with Enel of Italy. Siemens immediately said it would appeal that decision.
The court found Andreas Kley, a 63-year-old former finance chief at Siemens' power generation unit, guilty of bribing managers at Enel and of breach of trust, and handed him a two-year suspended sentence.
Horst Vigener, 73, a former employee and consultant, was convicted of abetting bribery and given a nine-month suspended sentence.
During the trial, the two acknowledged involvement in paying some $7.9 million to a pair of officials at Enel in a bid to win contracts for Siemens-made gas turbines between 1999 and 2002.
Both asserted it had not been Siemens' idea to offer bribes to win contracts. Vigener's lawyer said the Enel officials had approached him with demands for payments, and Kley also said they had suddenly demanded money shortly before the contract was agreed.
Kley said in court that he had authorized the payment alone and had not consulted with top Siemens managers.
Prosecutors put the total value of contracts that were sought by a consortium of Siemens and Italy's Ansaldo at $592 million, with at least $444.5 million of that going to Siemens.
The court ordered Siemens to make a payment $51.4 million, reflecting profits from the deal. The company swiftly announced an appeal.
''The company maintains that the courts order to forfeit the profits from two orders placed by Enel with Siemens Power Generation Group for the supply of power plant equipment in 2000 and 2001 is illegal,'' Siemens said in a statement. ''The court's decision has no basis in law or in fact.''
Judges stopped well short of a call by prosecutors for a 3½-year jail sentence for Kley and 1½ years for Vigener, and for Siemens to pay $132.2 million.
Both prosecutors and defense lawyers said they would consider appeals.
The case is one of a number of corruption scandals that have put pressure on Siemens over recent months.
Siemens - which makes everything from cell-phone network components to trains and is Europe's biggest engineering company by sales - has been rocked by separate investigations over money taken from corporate accounts and allegedly used to pay bribes to help land telecommunications deals.
Siemens shares closed down 0.3 percent Monday at $117.52.
