A Chattanooga man was sentenced Tuesday to federal prison for hatching a $1.4 million bribery scheme while working as a corporate manager at Home Depot.
Ronald Douglass Matheny, 43, was sentenced in Atlanta to serve two years and three months and ordered to pay more than half a million dollars in restitution.
“This defendant abused the trust and authority given to him by his employer and lined his own pockets at the company’s expense,” said U.S. Attorney Sally Quillian Yates in a release.
Matheny, who pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges last May, was a product merchant in Home Depot’s flooring department and oversaw the locations of flooring merchandise in all Home Depot stores. Home Depot employed Matheny for 20 years.
Between 2002 and 2005, federal prosecutors say Matheny and “several unnamed co-conspirators” made deals with flooring suppliers who paid him if he arranged for preferential placement of their goods.
He also was paid by suppliers to purchase their products for Home Depot stores at a higher price, prosecutors say.
“We don’t tolerate kickbacks, bribes or any other fraudulent schemes, which is why we gladly cooperated with authorities in the investigation and prosecution of Matheny following the termination of his employment,” said Steve Holmes, a spokesman for Home Depot.
Matheny worked at Home Depot until 2007.
Patrick Crosby, a public affairs officer with the U.S. attorney’s office in Atlanta, said he couldn’t comment on whether charges were being brought against Matheny’s co-conspirators.
Home Depot first began to look into Matheny’s behavior after receiving an anonymous tip, officials said. The case was investigated by the Internal Revenue Service-Criminal Investigation and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.