According to the indictment, an entity referred to as “Company W” consented to direct more than $5 million in work on a sewer overflow facility and related park improvements to Ferguson's company Xcel Construction Services Inc. under a contract executed in April 2003. The indictment alleges that, earlier, Company W had selected for the project a contractor whose bid was 23% lower than Xcel's. The indictment also alleges that Ferguson, assisted by Kwame Kilpatrick and Mercardo, attempted to extort Company W to award Ferguson a substantial portion of a $140-million contract for work involving Detroit’s Oakwood Pump Station. 

The 91-page indictment details similar activities involving other contractors suspended by BOWC.

In July, three of the suspended firms—Lakehore Engineering Services, L. D'Agostini and Sons and Detroit-based Inland Waters Pollution Control—were named in a civil lawsuit filed by the Macomb Interceptor Drain Drainage District that alleges Kwame Kilpatrick, Ferguson, Mercardo, Kilpatrick aide Derrick Miller and a list contractors and subcontractors engaged in a conspiracy to bill $25.7 million in overcharges for a 15-mile sewer repair project in Sterling Heights in 2004 and 2005.

On Dec. 21, BOWC agreed to file a motion to intervene as an additional plaintiff in the suit.

DWSD spokeswoman Mary P. Alfonso says DWSD does not customarily issue new contract bids or awards to companies that are either suing DWSD or being sued by DWSD for as long as any action is pending.

The interceptor suit isn’t expected to be presented in U.S. District Court until September.

Other firms suspended by BOWC include Ferguson Enterprises Inc., Detroit; Johnson Construction Services, Detroit; A&F Environmental/Johnson Construction Services, Detroit; Maestro Associates, Farmington Hills, Ill.; Inland Management and Inland Rehabilitation Pipe Co., Detroit; DLZ Laboratories Inc., Columbus, Ohio; E&T Trucking, Detroit; and A&H Contractors, Detroit.