Posted on 06/17/2015 6:16:49 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The payments couldn’t help but catch the attention of the top procurement official at the Department of Veterans Affairs.
Employees in the purchasing department of a VA hospital in the Bronx had used government purchase cards like credit cards at least 2,000 times to buy prosthetic legs and arms for veterans.
Each time they swiped the cards, it was for $24,999. That was precisely one dollar below VA’s charging limit for purchase cards.
When word reached Congress about the $54,435,743 worth of prosthetics bought under such odd circumstances over two years — the subject of an inspector general investigation announced Monday — lawmakers demanded details. But they were told there was no documentation.
VA officials had prepared to tell Congress that the records had been destroyed by Hurricane Sandy, according to previously undisclosed records, until a senior adviser in the Secretary’s office pointed out that the timing was wrong and the excuse wouldn’t hold up....
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
When is SOMEONE going to be charged and jailed for these thefts??? Some poor schmuck who steals $200 from a liquor store sits in jail for years. But if you steal millions from the workers’ paychecks through taxes and enrich yourself and your cronies, that’s A-OK. Shame on the blind watchdogs in Congress who refuse to lock up the supervisors of these thieves.
Not a smidgen of corruption...
Outrageous, too many Clinton wannabes in gubmint.
A perfect description of why this behemoth of a government must be pruned down to a tenth of its size. Its too big to get out of its own way and will ultimately bring down the whole Republic by its inefficiency.
$54 million?! Wow a whole new level of criminality allowed by incompetence at the VA.
Whose credit cards and whose signatures.
Pretty easy to get the info.
Throw them into solitary until they feel like singing.
“VA officials had received an inquiry from Congress in September 2012 about the Bronx payments, but a letter signed by former secretary Eric Shinseki did not go out until July 2013. The agency had prepared to say that the records had been transferred to VA’s medical center in Manhattan, where they were destroyed in Hurricane Sandy, documents obtained by The Post show.
But in reviewing the claim that the records had been destroyed, a senior adviser in Shinseki’s office was skeptical. “Gemma — this isn’t going to work,” the adviser wrote in an e-mail obtained by The Post.”
unbelievable. and do they really want to pretend they bought prosthetics with all that money?
...During an 18-month period that ended last year, he documented that up to $1.2 billion in prosthetics were bought with cards and without contracts, he testified.
I don’t know how many times I have run into the purchase card limit for equipment and repair costs at my federal job. All those purchases are logged and have to be justified by a request memo, and our limit is only $2500.
Fake boobs for their girlfriends are "prosthetics".
OTOH, should one of us mere citizens withdraw our own cash from the bank in amounts just below the IRS reporting threshold twice, we can expect a full audit!
I know....ridiculous. they act like this is just a case of improper procurement. obviously these were phony payments to fake vendors. I imagine the VA administrators set up the vendors with themselves as the account holders and then basically paid themselves. this would probably be the easiest fraud investigation ever but as long as its held up in oversight commeittees it will never get done
There is a Certifying Officer and a Contracting Officer, in additional to the budget committee or Management Officer, along with the head of that VA Hospital who are all in the loop.
As a former Certifying Officer, Contracting Officer and IT Systems Administrator (all three different jobs with government), I can assure FR readers that at least a half dozen people were involved in the scam.
The IG (I have been that for four years in two assignments as well), will pick that place apart in short order!
By raising the threshold to $50,000.01!
Maybe they got them at Walmart... if the price is actually $24,999.96
Yet the article is even written like its about skipping steps to make the system work faster. This is clearly theft.
Over 8 a day, every day for the past two years.
I too, have been a Purchasing Agent, Contract Officer and a COR....
There is way more than 1 person involved.
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