Navy veteran sentenced to 3 years in $9.1 million contract fraud scheme at Port Hueneme, Ventura

LOS ANGELES — A Navy veteran who built a company with a sailor positioned to influence military contracts was sentenced to three years in federal prison for a scheme that cost the Navy more than $9.1 million, officials announced Tuesday.

Cory Taylor Wright, 49, of Columbus, Georgia, was also ordered to pay $9,128,515 in restitution. He pleaded guilty in September 2025 to wire fraud.

Wright and co-conspirator Juan Carlos Aragon had worked in the Navy’s Mobile Utilities Support Equipment division, or MUSE, at Naval Base Ventura County in Port Hueneme.

The division supports power systems, including large generators used in military operations around the world.

As Wright approached retirement in 2016, the two agreed to form C&C Power Solutions LLC. Aragon remained in the Navy and held positions that gave him influence over MUSE contracts. They agreed he would become a 50% partner after retiring, according to Wright’s plea agreement.

Aragon promised to steer work to the company. Wright, in turn, paid him thousands of dollars in kickbacks and other benefits, including payments to a sporting club Aragon operated.

Rigged bids and false bills

The scheme began with payments to C&C for products and services it had not provided, prosecutors said. Once the company was operating, Wright and Aragon arranged competing bids with inflated prices so C&C would win subcontracts.

For one task order worth about $790,496 in 2017, they submitted multiple fake bids priced substantially above C&C’s bid.

Wright also submitted invoices claiming the company had completed work or delivered products when it had not. Those claims flowed through a prime contractor’s invoices and prompted Navy payments.

The pair then sought a larger prize: a Navy prime contract they expected to be worth tens of millions of dollars. They submitted fraudulent documents, including a past performance questionnaire, and concealed Aragon’s role and financial interest in C&C. The Navy awarded the company the contract in July 2019.

Wright continued submitting false documents and invoices until the Navy terminated three of the company’s task orders in late 2022 and early 2023. Prosecutors said the scheme cost the Navy approximately $9,128,515.

“This was not an isolated lapse in judgment or a fraud of limited duration,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum. They said Wright repeatedly used deception to undermine competitive federal contracting.

Aragon pleaded guilty to bribery of a public official. He was sentenced to 12 months and one day in prison and ordered to pay $97,960 in restitution.

The Defense Criminal Investigative Service and Naval Criminal Investigative Service investigated the case.