Donald R. Taylor Sentenced in $1M Bridge Contract Fraud

Donald R. Taylor, 78, of Eighty-Four, Pennsylvania, was sentenced to three years’ probation, slapped with a $30,000 fine, and ordered to complete 300 hours of community service for conspiring to defraud the United States out of more than $1 million in federal bridge construction subcontracts. The owner of Century Steel Erectors Co. (CSE) admitted to rigging the system by using a minority-owned shell company to illegally secure federally funded work he wasn’t eligible to bid on.

U.S. District Judge Nora Barry Fischer handed down the sentence after Taylor pleaded guilty on October 30, 2017, to one count of conspiracy to defraud the United States. Taylor admitted he conspired with Watson L. Maloy, Jr. to exploit the USDOT’s Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) program, which mandates inclusion of certified minority-owned firms on federally funded infrastructure projects. Because CSE wasn’t DBE-certified, Taylor and Maloy used Maloy’s firm, W.M.C.C. Inc. (WMCC), as a front to win subcontracts from the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation (PennDOT) and Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (PTC).

Taylor admitted that CSE employees — under his direction — identified projects, bid on contracts, negotiated terms, and performed all the work awarded to WMCC. To hide the scam, CSE staff used WMCC email accounts and phone lines, slapped magnetic WMCC signs over CSE logos on company vehicles at job sites, carried WMCC business cards, and posed as WMCC employees when dealing with state officials and general contractors. It was a full-blown identity swap designed to fool auditors and inspectors.

The fraud spanned from January 2012 to February 2014, during which time the duo fraudulently secured nine PennDOT subcontracts, pulling in approximately $1,065,000 in taxpayer-funded payments to WMCC. In return, Maloy collected periodic kickbacks ranging from $2,000 to $10,000 throughout the conspiracy — a payoff for lending his name to a scheme he knew was rigged.

Taylor made full restitution of $85,221.21 to PennDOT at the time of his guilty plea, but the damage to public trust runs deeper than dollars. The DBE program exists to level the playing field for small, minority-owned businesses — not to be hijacked by well-connected contractors gaming the system. Taylor’s actions undermined that mission and betrayed the integrity of federal contracting rules.

Maloy, 67, pleaded guilty to the same conspiracy charge and was sentenced by Chief U.S. District Judge Joy Flowers Conti on February 20, 2018, to two years’ probation and a $1,000 fine. The case was prosecuted by Assistant U.S. Attorneys Robert S. Cessar, Eric G. Olshan, and Christy Criswell Wiegand. The investigation was led by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Department of Transportation – Office of Inspector General, with support from the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission – Office of Inspector General.

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