The two executives are Thomas Early, chief financial officer of Ogilvy & Mather New York, and Shona Seifert, who was an executive group director at O&M at the time but is now president of TBWA\Chiat\Day in New York.
The pair face fines of as much as $250,000 (拢137,500) and five years' imprisonment, according to reports. They stand accused of directing certain employees to revise timesheets inflating the number of hours that had been spent on the campaign, as well as telling staff to record a specific percentage of their time on the account whether or not they were working on it. The pair also face charges that they made false statements to cover up the fraud.
Seifert and Early are due to appear at the South District of New York District Court today before Judge Richard Berman.
Ogilvy & Mather was appointed to the Office of National Drug Control Policy five years ago and the advertising it has created since it won the work originally, and following its reappointment in 2002, has been widely acclaimed. But the billings scandal, which first came to light in 2000, has dogged the WPP Group-owned agency, which paid the government $1.8m in settlement of a civil suit.
Reports say that the agency began altering timesheets when it was found that staff who worked on the $684m account were working less hours than anticipated.
In a statement, Ogilvy & Mather said that it had been "unprepared for the complex and unique federal record-keeping requirements" when it started working on the account and admitted that initially it did not meet federal requirements nor its own commitment to ethical standards.
The agency said that for more than three years it had cooperated with every government review and investigation of the billing missteps it voluntarily brought forward, including extensively cooperating with the US Attorney's Office in Manhattan for more than two years.
"We are aware that several individuals have been charged in connection with action that are alleged to have taken place while they worked on the initial ONDCP contract at Ogilvy. If true, their behaviour was inconsistent with the high standards the company promotes and maintains," the agency said in its statement.
The Washington Post reported that Early's position at Ogilvy is "under review", and that he plans to fight the charges.
Seifert said she had never committed any criminal misdeed of any nature. "While saddened and dismayed by these fallacious charges, I do welcome the opportunity to present evidence of my total innocence. I am innocent of any wrongdoing. I will contest these charges. I know I will be exonerated," she said in a statement.
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