Brent Spence Bridge Lawsuit Against ODOT: DBE Fraud and Walsh Case

The Brent Spence Bridge DBE fraud lawsuit is a federal civil rights and fraud case brought by Kentucky attorney Jamir Davis against the Walsh-Kokosing joint venture, the Ohio Department of Transportation, and several individuals, alleging that his certified Disadvantaged Business Enterprise firm was used to help win the $3.6 billion companion bridge contract and then pushed out of the work without pay. Davis filed the complaint on June 12, 2025, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio. Most of his claims were dismissed in March 2026, some with prejudice and some with leave to amend, and an amended complaint filed in June 2026 is now the subject of a pending motion to strike.¹

Who Filed the Lawsuit and What He Alleges

Jamir Davis is a Covington, Kentucky attorney and the former executive director of the Office for Civil Rights and Small Business Development at the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet.² His firm, J. Davis Law Firm, PLLC, is a certified DBE.³

According to the complaint, Davis was recruited onto the project’s diversity and inclusion team before the Walsh-Kokosing joint venture was awarded the progressive design-build contract in July 2023. The joint venture retained Cincinnati-based WEB Ventures LLC as the project’s Diversity and Inclusion Manager, and in February 2023 Davis’s firm signed a teaming agreement with WEB to support that role.³⁴

Davis alleges that WEB Ventures and its principal, Icy Williams, lacked the ten years of federal highway experience required by the project’s request for proposals, and that Williams told Walsh she would lean on Davis’s expertise to make up the gap. The complaint further alleges Walsh hired a third-party contractor to fabricate Williams’s resume so it would pass ODOT’s compliance review.³

Once the contract was won, Davis says his name, credentials, and proprietary work product were used to satisfy DBE requirements while he was cut out of the project and never paid. The complaint claims WEB told Davis his ODOT-approved billing rate was $90 an hour when it was actually $252 an hour, and that WEB omitted his hours from reimbursement submissions to ODOT.⁵

The stakes are significant. The preconstruction DBE goal on the project was set at 9% of contract price, with 7% targeted for later phases, which works out to roughly $320 million in work earmarked for qualifying firms.⁶⁴

What ODOT Found and What Davis Says Happened Next

Davis filed an administrative complaint with ODOT before going to federal court. In a report dated March 20, 2024, ODOT determined that WEB Ventures “failed to negotiate in good faith with J. Davis Law Firm” and failed to pay the firm promptly. The investigation did not substantiate Davis’s broader claim that the Walsh-Kokosing team fraudulently misrepresented its qualifications during procurement.⁷

Walsh eventually terminated WEB Ventures and Williams. Davis’s federal complaint alleges that despite the good-faith finding, ODOT took no further enforcement action, ignored follow-up fraud complaints, delayed later investigations, and denied public records requests.³

After WEB was removed, the joint venture hired Cincinnati-based Make It Plain Consulting as the replacement diversity and inclusion manager. Davis alleges that firm was also unqualified for the role.⁸ A U.S. Department of Transportation database entry lists Make It Plain’s current DBE status as “Decertification” by the KYTC DBE Certification Committee, though the timing and reason are not detailed in available records.⁹ The complaint also alleges Walsh later moved to a “self-perform approach,” handling oversight of minority, small business, and women-owned business contracts internally rather than through an independent third party.¹⁰

Walsh’s Prior DBE Settlement in Massachusetts

Davis’s complaint points to an earlier case. In April 2023, Walsh Construction agreed to pay $1,099,000 to settle False Claims Act allegations tied to the Whittier Bridge/I-95 Improvement Project in Massachusetts. A subcontractor, Melo’s Rodbusters Inc., paid an additional $146,102, for a combined $1.24 million.¹¹

Walsh admitted to helping Melo’s, a certified DBE, with work Melo’s was supposed to perform independently, including selecting suppliers and participating in price negotiations. Melo’s admitted providing inaccurate information to MassDOT about those negotiations. The government’s theory was that Melo’s acted as a “mere pass-through” rather than performing a commercially useful function as DBE rules require.¹² Davis cites the settlement as evidence that Walsh has “a long history of engaging in practices that constitute DBE fraud.”⁸

The Two Federal Filings and Where They Stand

Davis has pursued his claims in two federal courts.

The False Claims Act Case

On January 10, 2025, Davis filed a qui tam action under the federal False Claims Act in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, case number 2:25-cv-00004, before Judge David L. Bunning. A qui tam suit lets a private citizen sue on behalf of the government when they believe federal funds were obtained by fraud; the government can intervene and take over. The complaint was filed under seal. On April 3, 2025, the United States declined to intervene. The complaint was unsealed on April 7, 2025. Davis voluntarily dismissed the case on July 2, 2025, with the government’s consent, and it was terminated on July 3, 2025.¹³

The Civil Rights and State Law Case

On June 12, 2025, Davis filed a broader civil complaint in the Southern District of Ohio, Western Division, case number 1:25-cv-393. Defendants include the Walsh Kokosing Joint Venture and Walsh Kokosing Joint Venture II, Walsh project manager Arik Quam, WEB Ventures and Icy Williams, ODOT, and three ODOT officials: then-Secretary Jack Marchbanks, Deputy Director Lauren Purdy, and administrator Debora Green.³

The complaint invokes 42 U.S.C. § 1981 (racial discrimination in contracts), § 1983 (civil rights violations by government actors), § 1985 (conspiracy to interfere with civil rights), Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and federal DBE regulations. It also raises state-law claims for tortious interference with a prospective business advantage, intentional misrepresentation, unjust enrichment, fraudulent concealment, negligence, civil conspiracy, and denial of access to public records. Davis seeks compensatory and punitive damages and asks the court to vacate a March 2025 arbitration award that found WEB Ventures unjustly enriched but not fraudulent.¹⁴

The March 2026 Dismissal Ruling

On March 30, 2026, Judge Douglas R. Cole granted the defendants’ motions to dismiss, with different outcomes for different claims.¹

All claims against Icy Williams (Counts 1 through 5) were dismissed with prejudice, meaning they cannot be refiled. The court found those claims barred by res judicata because they had already been litigated in the arbitration against WEB Ventures, Williams’s employer. Certain claims against ODOT and Debora Green in her official capacity were also dismissed with prejudice.¹⁴

Other counts, including Counts 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, and 12, were dismissed without prejudice, and the court gave Davis 30 days to move for leave to amend. The court also raised a procedural problem: because Davis was representing his LLC without a licensed attorney admitted to the Southern District of Ohio, it ordered him to show cause why the firm should not be dismissed for failure to prosecute, and it said it would analyze the remaining claims only as to Davis individually.¹⁴

Davis filed an amended complaint on June 2, 2026. Defendants Jack Marchbanks and ODOT responded on June 10, 2026, with a motion to strike. As of mid-June 2026, that motion is pending.¹

How Federal DBE Rule Changes Affect the Case

The legal ground under Davis’s claims has shifted while his case has been moving through court. In September 2024, the Eastern District of Kentucky issued a preliminary injunction in Mid-America Milling Company v. U.S. Department of Transportation, ruling that the DBE program’s race- and sex-based presumptions of disadvantage violated the equal protection component of the Fifth Amendment. By October 2024, the court clarified that the injunction reached contracts in any state where the plaintiffs operated or bid, including Ohio.¹⁵

Under FHWA guidance, ODOT was required to set DBE contract goals to 0% on any project the plaintiffs identified as one they intended to bid on.¹⁶ On October 3, 2025, the U.S. Department of Transportation issued an Interim Final Rule eliminating race- and sex-based presumptions from DBE certification. Applicants must now show social and economic disadvantage individually, existing DBEs must be reevaluated, and until that reevaluation is complete, recipients of federal transportation funds cannot set new DBE contract goals or count DBE participation toward them.¹⁷ The MAMCO case itself was terminated in March 2026 as moot in light of the regulatory changes.¹⁸

The practical consequence for Davis is that the goal structure he alleges was circumvented has been suspended or restructured at the federal level, which complicates the enforcement picture for the DBE-based portions of his claims going forward.

1
PacerMonitor.com. Davis v. Walsh Kokosing Joint Venture et al
2
Jdaviscounsel.com. About J. Davis Law Firm
3
ENR.com. Davis v. Walsh Kokosing Joint Venture Complaint
4
Fox19.com. No Oversight of Funds Earmarked for Minority-Owned Businesses on Bridge Project, Attorney Claims
5
ENR.com. Lawsuit Alleges DBE Fraud on $3.6B Brent Spence Bridge Project
6
Cincinnati-oh.gov. Brent Spence Bridge Corridor Project Management Plan
7
Journal-news.com. Northern Kentucky Attorney Sues ODOT, Contractors on Brent Spence Companion Bridge Project
8
Construction Dive. Lawsuit Alleges DBE Fraud on Brent Spence Bridge Project
9
Transportation.gov. Make It Plain Consulting LLC
10
WLWT.com. Brent Spence Companion Bridge Project Complaint
11
Justice.gov. Two Companies Agree To Pay $1.24 Million To Resolve Allegations of Fraud on Whittier Bridge/I-95
12
OIG.DOT.gov. Walsh Construction Company and Melo’s Rodbusters Settlement
13
PacerMonitor.com. Davis et al v. Walsh Construction Company et al
14
Casemine.com. Davis v. Walsh Kokosing Joint Venture, 1:25-cv-393
15
Transportation.ohio.gov. DBE Program Injunction
16
Highways.dot.gov. DBE Preliminary Injunction Implementation Memo
17
Federal Register. Disadvantaged Business Enterprise Program Interim Final Rule
18
CourtListener.com. Mid-America Milling Company v. U.S. Department of Transportation