DETROIT — Cash bribes and trips to Las Vegas helped pave the way for a $47-million-a-year contract between the city and a Texas company that recycles sludge, a former executive said Monday as he pleaded guilty in federal court.

The influence-peddling reached a climax in fall 2007 when a City Council member accepted payments to vote in favor of the deal with Houston-based Synagro Technologies, the government alleges. The contract was approved, 5-4.

"People expected me to give things to get their support," Jim Rosendall told a judge ...

In court documents, he said his courtship of Detroit officials began in 2001 when he introduced himself to "City Official A" by presenting several campaign checks and explaining that Synagro was working to acquire a company, Minergy Detroit, that had a waste contract with the city.

For the next few years, Rosendall said he attended fundraisers for City Official A and donated about $200,000 to nonprofit groups, political action committees and other campaign entities affiliated with the official.

In September 2003, he said he chartered a plane at a cost of $20,000 to fly the official and others to Las Vegas to see a boxing match.

Court documents do not identify City Official A or the City Council member accused of taking cash for voting in favor of the Synagro contract.

But records obtained by The Associated Press in a Freedom of Information Act request show about $3,000 in charges to a city MasterCard account used by then-Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick. The transactions were at the Mandalay Bay Resort in Las Vegas on the same date when the flight returned to Detroit.