JBER airman accused of conspiracy, bribery related to Eielson F-35 work, JBER

A runway with a dozen fighter jets anda mountains in the background
JBER Runway (Photo by Staff Sgt. Curt Beach)

A senior enlisted airman and the owners of a construction company were arrested Tuesday, accused of conspiracy, bribery and money laundering involving government contracts at two Alaska military bases.

A 26-count federal indictment against Ryan Dalbec, 42, and Raihana Dalbec, 27, both of Virginia, and Brian Lowell Nash II, 30, of Washington, was unsealed after their arrest.

The three are accused of conspiring from March to November 2019 to help the Dalbecs’ Best Choice Construction LLC win millions of dollars in military contracts. The company is headquartered in Fargo, North Dakota.

Nash was a contract specialist in the U.S. Air Force, assigned to the 673rd Contracting Squadron at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson in Anchorage, Alaska, according to the indictment.

The Dalbecs allegedly paid and promised Nash more than $460,000 in exchange for confidential, non-public bidding information that helped Best Choice secure contracts at the Anchorage base and a construction contract related to the F-35 aircraft program at Eielson Air Force Base near Fairbanks, Alaska.

Online court records did not list attorneys for the three, and hometowns were not immediately available.

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