Dominican Aluminum Extruder Kingtom Subject to New EAPA Investigation

Kingtom Aluminio SRL, a Dominican Republic aluminum extrusion company, is under Enforce and Protect Act investigation by CBP over suspected antidumping and countervailing duty evasion, CBP said in a notice posted May 19. The Aluminum Extrusions Fair Trade Committee, represented by Robert DeFrancesco of Wiley, filed the allegation against the company. Kingtom is already involved in other EAPA cases (see 2104280032), some of which are being litigated over at the Court of International Trade (see 2105180055).

Although Kingtom is mentioned as a manufacturer in the previous EAPA cases, AEFTC said "that since those cases have been filed with CBP, Kingtom has begun acting as the importer of record for shipments." The trade group "provided import data and other sources showing that former Kingtom clients are no longer listed as importers but are now listed as consignees and notify parties for shipments of aluminum extrusions from the Dominican Republic," CBP said. The AEFTC also said Kingtom lacks the capacity to make the type of extrusions going to the U.S. or to produce the volume it is sending. AEFTC also submitted an affidavit from an industry expert providing more detail on the company's production deficiencies that are said to indicate transshipment.

CBP said reasonable suspicion of evasion exists and began its own investigation that relied on, in part, information from the previous EAPA cases. "Overall, Kingtom’s submissions were highly inaccurate and riddled with contradictions that cast the reliability of all its submissions in doubt -- even suggesting possible fraud," CBP said. "As a result, the case records provided substantial evidence that Kingtom was unable to produce all of the aluminum extrusions it reported. As such, CBP determined twice that Kingtom’s imports into the United States were evading the Orders by transshipment."

Between the AEFTC allegations and the past EAPA information, CBP found "reasonable suspicion exists that the aluminum extrusions produced by Kingtom and entered into the customs territory of the United States by Kingtom are, at least in part, transshipped from China," it said. As a result, CBP will require live entry and other interim measures on entries by Kingtom, it said. Kingtom's lawyer, Brady Mills of Morris Manning, didn't comment.