HOUSTON, Tx., April 16, 2026: On Tuesday, a Houston judge overturned Ramón Alexandro Rovirosa Martinez’s 2025 conviction over bribery charges. According to the U.S. Department of Justice, Rovirosa Martinez, a Houston businessman, was convicted by a jury on charges of bribery involving Mexican government officials and Petróleos Mexicanos (PEMEX) on December 5, 2025. PEMEX is state-owned company operated by the Mexican government.
Federal Assistant Attorney Mathew R. Galeotti said that Rovirosa Martinez “orchestrated a scheme to bribe Mexican officials to benefit himself and his companies” after the conviction was announced.
According to the court documents, Rovirosa Martinez paid $150,000 in bribes between 2019 and 2021 to three Mexican oil executives at PEMEX and a subsidiary to help his company keep contracts with the oil company worth around $2.5 million. The Houston jury convicted the Houston oil company executive with one count of conspiracy to violate the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). The 1977 FCPA prohibits officials at publicly traded companies from paying bribes to foreign officials for business contracts.
At the time of his conviction, FBI Special Agent in Charge Douglas Williams said that “most individuals applying for American citizenship treat our laws and customs with respect.” Rovirosa Martinez is a Mexican national who has been a U.S. legal permanent resident since 2016 and was applying for U.S. citizenship at the time of his conviction.
On Tuesday, Houston federal Judge Kenneth Hoyt acquitted Rovirosa Martinez of the bribery charges after he found that federal prosecutors failed to provide translators for cross examination at trial. Hoyt had signaled his intent to vacate the conviction during a status hearing on April 6. Hoyt oversaw the trial in which Rovirosa Martinez was convicted. Prosecutors objected to Hoyt’s intent to overturn the verdict.
Rovirosa Martinez was arrested on August 10, 2025. Federal prosecutors relied on phone messages between the defendant and alleged co-conspirator Alberto Avila Lizarraga. Avila Lizarraga, who is a former PEMEX executive, has been a fugitive since Rovirosa Martinez was arrested. The messages retrieved from Avila Lizarraga’s telephone included messages that alleged bribery. One message retrieved from the telephone reads “debían cumplir el trato.” Translated into English the phrase says, “must deliver on the agreement.” Another message says that the solution to an unknown problem would be “un Hublot como comisión, jaja,” reads the message. It translates to “a Hublot as commission.” The alleged Hublot watch was worth around $150,000 according to prosecutors.
However, the defense contended that the telephone messages did not show that Rovirosa Martinez knew anything about what Avila Lizarraga was doing and that prosecutors did not produce any evidence showing that Rovirosa Martinez had committed a crime. The defense also pointed out that the federal prosecutors did not have any government witnesses proving the bribery allegations.
Shortly after the conviction, the defense team filed a motion for acquittal arguing that the government failed to prove its case and that the prosecutors allowed the jury to hear a recording between Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and Rovirosa Martinez during closing arguments that had not previously being introduced into evidence. The defense lawyers also accused the prosecutors of introducing other evidence – text messages that were improperly translated and not properly introduced into evidence at the trial.
Ramón Alexandro Rovirosa Martinez celebrates his acquittal and release with his wife Tanya (right) and lead defense attorney Ryan McConnell (left), courtesy photograph.
In his ruling, Hoyt writes that “the government has not produced evidence showing that the Translators were unavailable or that Rovirosa was given an opportunity to cross-examine them prior to trial.” Hoyt was referring to the erroneous translations of the messages shown to the jury without being properly admitted. The judge added that “the precedent is clear, the government had a duty to produce the Translators for cross examination.”
The judge added that “the record shows that the government intentionally did not call as witnesses the Translators,” adding that “Rovirosa was not provided an opportunity to cross-examine them prior to or during trial.” The judge also found that the FBI special agent who certified that the translations from the Yahoo and WhatsApp messages were accurate was not an “expert” translator from Spanish to English.
The judge reasoned that translations require specialize knowledge “in order to capture words and expressions” important to the context of the communication. The judge acknowledged that it was the jury who discovered the prosecutor’s failure to provide the messages properly to them when they requested the original Spanish version of the messages for them to review as they deliberated the case. The judge was unable to provide them to the jury because the prosecutors had not properly introduced them into evidence at trial.
Judge Hoyt said that the “government intentionally did not call witnesses,” as he found Rovirosa Martinez innocent of the charges.
In a press release, attorney Ryan McConnell, who is representing Rovirosa Martinez, said of the acquittal that “we are grateful for the court’s careful consideration” of the constitutionality of not providing the defendant with translators during the weeklong trial. He was released from federal custody on Tuesday.
Judge Hoyt’s order prohibits federal prosecutors from prosecuting Rovirosa Martinez again on the bribery charges, ending the case against him. The Mexican businessman’s acquittal is only the fourth FCPA case to be overturned since the law was enacted, according to the defense attorneys.
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Cover photo: Ramón Alexandro Rovirosa Martinez, founder of Roma Energy México, via Linkedin, 2020.
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