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WASHINGTON - Sen. Ted Stevens was clueless about the cost and scope of a pricey makeover of his Alaska cabin that led to federal corruption charges and threatened his lengthy career, his lawyer said Thursday at the opening of his trial.

BAGHDAD, May 29, 2008 – A contractor in Iraq charged under military law with stabbing another contractor was scheduled to be arraigned today in Baghdad. Alaa “Alex” Mohammad Ali, a contractor charged with aggravated assault, was scheduled to be arraigned today at Camp Victory here. The charge against Ali stems from the Feb. 23 alleged stabbing of another contractor at a combat outpost near Hit. This is the first time a civilian will be tried by court-martial under a 2006 amendment to the Uniform Code of Military Justice contained in the 2007 National Defense Authorization Act, U.S. military officials said....

About POGO's Contractor Misconduct Database The government awards contracts to companies with histories of misconduct such as contract fraud and environmental, ethics, and labor violations. In the absence of a centralized federal database listing instances of misconduct, the Project On Government Oversight (POGO) is providing such data. We believe that it will lead to improved contracting decisions and public access to information about how the government spends hundreds of billions of taxpayer money each year on goods and services. Top 50 Contractors Contractor Federal Contract $ (FY2005) Instances of Misconduct (Since 1995) Misconduct $ (Since 1995) 1. Lockheed Martin $24944.6m...

WASHINGTON, April 6, 2008 – Multinational Corps Iraq announced yesterday that a civilian contractor accompanying the force has been charged with aggravated assault under military law. Multinational Corps Iraq announced yesterday that a civilian contractor accompanying the force has been charged with aggravated assault under military law. Alaa “Alex” Mohammad Ali, an interpreter, is the first contractor to be charged under a 2006 amendment to the Uniform Code of Military Justice – Section 552 of the National Defense Authorization Act of Fiscal Year 2007, MNC-I officials said. Ali, who holds Canadian and Iraqi citizenship, is accused of stabbing another contractor....

Shell companies in Cayman Islands allow KBR to avoid Medicare, Social Security deductions CAYMAN ISLANDS - Kellogg Brown & Root, the nation's top Iraq war contractor and until last year a subsidiary of Halliburton Corp., has avoided paying hundreds of millions of dollars in federal Medicare and Social Security taxes by hiring workers through shell companies based in this tropical tax haven. More than 21,000 people working for KBR in Iraq - including about 10,500 Americans - are listed as employees of two companies that exist in a computer file on the fourth floor of a building on a palm-studded...

SAN DIEGO A defense contractor has been sentenced to 12 years in federal prison for bribing former U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham with cash, meals, trips and other gifts in exchange for nearly $90 million in Pentagon work. Brent Wilkes showed no emotion as U.S. District Judge Larry Burns delivered the sentence Tuesday in San Diego.

FoxNews is reporting

A quiet Denver suburb and neighborhood unintentionally became a battleground in the heated abortion debate Saturday afternoon. The protest was not at a doctor’s office or abortion clinic but at the home of a construction subcontractor working on the construction of a Planned Parenthood center in east Denver.

WASHINGTON, Nov. 29, 2007 – Installation operations and quality of life programs for soldiers and their families would be affected worldwide if the Army doesn’t receive additional funding from Congress soon, a senior officer said here today. “Absolutely, it’s an urgent need,” Maj. Gen. Edgar E. Stanton III, director of the Army’s budget office, said of the necessity for the Army to obtain nearly $55 billion from Congress to fund operations in Afghanistan and Iraq. The active Army is now using $26 billion in appropriations that were earmarked for base-support operations to fund its overseas global war on terrorism operations,...

A contractor who admitted supplying illegal immigrant workers to the Northern Kentucky home building industry was sentenced Thursday to serve 18 months in federal prison. After he was sentenced on the federal charges, Robert Pratt was immediately arrested by Boone County authorities on charges of fraud, saying he had underpaid unemployment taxes. Pratt, who lives in Franklin, Tenn., was one of seven people sentenced Thursday in U.S. District Court in Covington for knowingly hiring illegal workers. The other six - all of whom worked with or for Pratt, several of whom are family members - drew sentences ranging from probation...

BAGHDAD, Nov. 16, 2007 – The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is overseeing 541 projects valued at $2 billion in a range of areas in Iraq, including renovating hospitals and schools, installing new water and sewer lines, electrical generation, new water and wastewater treatment plants, bridges and road paving. Namir El Akabi, chief executive officer of an Iraqi contracting company, said he sees progress in his home country. U.S. Army photo  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. In the past three years, more than 3,700 projects, valued at $5.6 billion, have been completed. Namir El Akabi, chief executive officer of...

Respect Blackwater The firm's operations in Iraq are not sordid -- they're just business Monday, November 5, 2007 By ROGER ROLAND The frenzied debate over the role of Blackwater USA in Iraq has resulted in more misconceptions than truths. The most common myth, propagated by the media and some politicians, is that Blackwater's private security contractors are mercenaries working for the United States military. This simply is not the case. Blackwater's contractors do not support U.S. armed forces in battle against terrorists and insurgents. They are not soldiers, but rather a corps of professionals who provide personal security to American...

New charges have been filed alleging that the CIA's former No. 3 official used his influence in that role to support a proposed $100 million government contract for his best friend, a defense contractor, in return for lavish vacations, private jet flights and a lucrative job offer. The indictment, returned Thursday by a federal grand jury in San Diego, supersedes charges brought in February against career CIA man Kyle "Dusty" Foggo and Poway-based contractor Brent Wilkes. The charges grew from the bribery scandal that landed former U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham in prison. Foggo resigned from the spy agency a...

BOSTON (AP) — A leather company owner was arrested during a raid at his company Tuesday and accused of hiring hundreds of illegal immigrants to work in poor conditions so he could meet the demands of $91 million in military contracts. Francesco Insolia, 50, and three top managers were arrested after federal agents raided Michael Bianco Inc. in New Bedford on Tuesday morning. About two thirds of the company's 500 employees were detained by immigration officials for possible deportation, authorities said. U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan accused Insolia of exploiting the illegal immigrants to maximize his profits on the military contracts...

The grisly details of the murder and dismemberment of four U.S. citizen contractors in the Iraqi city of Fallujah have found their way onto U.S. soil in a dispute that may reach the Supreme Court. In the case, the estates of the four late contractors filed suit against Blackwater Security, a company with whom the decedents contracted to perform military escort services. The estates attribute the contractors' deaths to the allegedly negligent and deceitful actions of the contracting companies, asserting claims of common-law fraud and wrongful death under North Carolina law. Blackwater, however, contends that the state law claims are...

Federal prosecutors are preparing to seek indictments against a former top CIA official and a San Diego defense contractor at the center of the bribery scandal that sent former U.S. Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham to prison. Two government officials familiar with the investigation told The Associated Press on Wednesday that prosecutors plan to ask a San Diego grand jury to return charges of honest services fraud and conspiracy against Kyle "Dusty" Foggo and his close friend, Brent Wilkes, whose lawyers have said he is one of four unidentified co-conspirators described in the 2005 plea agreement for Cunningham, a San Diego...

SGT Jason Hess from the 1st Cavalry Division only wanted some better mats for his troops when he emailed a company called Discount Floor Mats for information: --- To Whom it may concern: Do you ship to APO addresses? I'm in the 1st Cavalry Division stationed in Iraq and we are trying to order some mats but we are looking for who ships to APO first. SGT Hess --- Seems like a fair question. There are many companies that don't/won't ship to APO addresses for many reasons. The main reason is that once the packages leave the states, they leave...

WASHINGTON The investigation stemming from the bribery conviction of former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-Calif., will continue well past the November midterm elections under a federal court schedule set Monday. The development came at a status hearing for defense contractor Mitchell Wade, who is cooperating with federal prosecutors after pleading guilty in February to bribing Cunningham in exchange for government contracts. U.S. District Judge Ricardo Urbina agreed to delay sentencing proceedings against Wade and set the next status hearing in his case for March 12. That will allow Wade's cooperation to continue in the investigation, which still has several unresolved...

Hurricane Wilma damaged their roof and like so many victims of the storm, one South Florida couple had trouble finding a roofer because of a shortage of materials and workers. John and Kathleen Jurewicz finally did get contractor, but it has been anything but smooth sailing. The couple hired McClung contractors to do the work. With their insurance money, the couple paid the company nearly $14,000 for the roofing materials which was suppose to be turned over to ABC supply company. Four months later the supplies still sit in their driveway and the work on the roof was never completed....

BURLINGTON, Vt. --A former University of Vermont College of Medicine professor was ordered Wednesday to serve a year and a day in federal prison for using false data to obtain federal research grants. Eric Poehlman, 50, who left UVM in 2001 for the University of Montreal and was fired from there amid revelations about his scientific misconduct, will serve the sentence at a federal prison work camp in Maryland. An official with the National Institutes of Health said Poehlman's case marked the first time a researcher would serve time in prison for falsifying data to obtain federal grants. (snap) Poehlman,...

SAN DIEGO U.S. agents arrested 22 illegal immigrants Wednesday who worked for a company that provided services to the Camp Pendleton Marine Corps base. The workers, all Mexican men, were arrested at their homes by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers during an early morning sweep. Agents were looking for 72 illegal workers employed by Burtech Pipeline, Inc., an Encinitas-based business that had a contract at Camp Pendleton, the base near Oceanside that is home to some 40,000 military personnel, ICE spokeswoman Lauren Mack said. None of those arrested had worked at Camp Pendleton, but Mack said some of the...

EXCLUSIVE - Mistress turns in corrupt China vice admiral-sources BEIJING (Reuters) - One of China's top brass has been charged with accepting millions of dollars in bribes from contractors after one of his mistresses blew the whistle, independent sources with ties to the military said on Wednesday. If found guilty, Vice Admiral Wang Shouye, 63, one of five navy deputy commanders and a member of China's parliament, would be the most senior People's Liberation Army (PLA) officer ever convicted of a crime. "Wang Shouye kept several mistresses. One of them reported him to the authorities" after he refused to give...

A lawsuit has been filed in U.S. District Court here by three migrant farmworkers from Thailand against two local growers and a Los Angeles-based labor contractor, alleging that the workers were underpaid and housed in substandard conditions. In the suit filed on Monday, some of the workers said they were forced to go into personal debt in order to get a job in the United States. They said they were promised work that didn't materialize. A number of alleged violations of state and federal law were outlined in the suit. It seeks class action status for all Thai workers brought...

WASHINGTON – Defense contractor Mitchell J. Wade pleaded guilty in federal court Friday to conspiring to funnel more than $1 million in bribes to former Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham. Wade, 46, admitted to his part in a payoff scheme intended to win federal contracts for his firm, MZM Inc., that included an attempt to bribe a Pentagon official. Wade's sweetheart purchase of Cunningham's Del Mar-area house figured prominently in the ex-congressman's own guilty plea last fall. Wade bought Cunningham's house for $1.67 million in November 2003 and then sold it eight months later at a $700,000 loss. The businessman began...

A police officer who temporarily gave up the fight against crime on the streets of St. Paul to provide security in war-torn Iraq died Thursday when a roadside bomb blew up his vehicle. Kyle Kaszynski, a St. Paul police officer for seven years and once a fixture on the force's horse patrol, took a leave from the department in October to work for a private security company in Iraq. He knew the dangers of his work, both in St. Paul and Iraq, but never retreated from the challenges. "It's like riding a horse — it's a risky proposition, but you...

FEMA Katrina Funeral Contractor Desecrated CorpsesThursday, 15 September 2005, 2:15 pm Article: Jason Leopold Division of Funeral Corp. Charged With Desecrating Corpses Hired to Collect Deceased Victims of Hurricane Katrina By Jason LeopoldA funeral services company which recently learned that one of its subsidiaries is negotiating a lucrative contract with the Federal Emergency Management Agency to remove dead bodies in areas ravaged by Hurricane Katrina, paid $100 million to settle a class-action lawsuit several years ago alleging the company desecrated thousands of corpses, and dumped bodies into mass graves.Moreover, the company paid $200,000 to settle a whistleblower lawsuit that sought...

ALI BASE, Iraq, Aug. 12, 2005 — Airman 1st Class Catherine Dilena did not know what to think when her first sergeant dropped by her office and told her to stand by to meet with him in a few minutes. Nervously, the 407th Expeditionary Civil Engineer Squadron client support administrator here waited for him to return, mentally running through a checklist of reasons why he would want to speak with her. A few minutes later, instead of chatting with her first sergeant, she received a counseling session of sorts from an unexpected visitor — her mom. “It was surreal to...

Some face possible $1,000 fine, jail time By Karen Kucher UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER July 30, 2005 CHULA VISTA – Twenty-three unlicensed contractors have been caught in a two-day underground sting and sweep by the Contractors State License Board, officials announced yesterday. Undercover investigators used a two-story home in Chula Vista owned by the mother of a licensed contractor as bait for the sting. On Wednesday, 13 contractors who had advertised in newspapers and mailers, or who were the subject of complaints, were invited to the house to submit bids for such projects as painting, landscaping and installing a swimming pool....

RENO, Nevada (AP) -- Security contractors were heckled, humiliated and physically abused by U.S. Marines in Iraq while jailed for 72 hours with insurgents, one of the detainees said Friday. "It was disbelief the whole time. I couldn't believe what was happening," said Matt Raiche, 34, an ex-Marine who was one of 16 American and three Iraqi contractors detained at Camp Falluja last month. "I just found it crazy that we were being held with terrorists, that we were put in the same facility with them," he told The Associated Press in an interview at his lawyer's office. "They were...

Israel And Freedom For Jonathan Pollard By Caroline Glick The Jerusalem Post - With INA Publisher's Note Below Jerusalem ---- April 28......Jonathan Pollard is one of the most polarizing figures of our times. Pollard, a former intelligence analyst in US naval intelligence, has now served 20 years of a life imprisonment sentence following his conviction for transferring classified US intelligence materials relating to Arab ballistic missile and nonconventional weapons programs to Israel from May 1984 until his arrest in November 1985. For his contribution to Israel's security and for his long suffering in prison, Israel considers Pollard a national hero....

I need a bit of advice on what could become a legal matter. Here's the story: Last December we put a down payment on a new roof for our house. The work was supposed to be done the 2nd week in Jan (weather permitting). The contractor had jobs to do in Florida during the winter, but he would do ours before he left. The contract called for 1/3 at signing, 1/3 when work began and 1/3 after completion. On Jan 10 I recieved a call that a crew would be out the next day to clear any snow from the...

BAE Systems to acquire United Defense BAE Systems, Britain's biggest defense contractor, said yesterday that it is acquiring United Defense Industries Inc., an Arlington-based builder of combat vehicles, artillery and naval guns. The $4 billion deal secures BAE's place as the Pentagon's leading foreign defense contractor and marks one of the largest acquisitions of a U.S. defense firm by a foreign company. BAE Systems North America, BAE's Rockville-based subsidiary, will formally make the acquisition. The company designs, manufactures and maintains military aircraft, submarines, surface ships and their systems. United Defense, in business since World War II, makes combat vehicles such...

In April 2004, followers of Iraqi Shi‘ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr launched a well-coordinated uprising across southern Iraq. While Western media focused on events in Sadr City, Najaf, and Karbala, violence occurred elsewhere as well. A Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) source forwarded the following after-action report regarding violence in the town of Al-Kut, the capital of the Wassit governorate and home to the Ukrainian contingent.The unclassified report, written by a coalition security contractor, highlights dysfunction between regional coalition offices and the Coalition Provisional Authority headquarters in Baghdad, as well as tension between diplomats and security officers. The summary faulted a British...

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/world/2959931 Allan was a childhood friend, he loved people and believed in the best of everyone. He was a jokster and a prankster and his devilish smile could truly light up a room. He went to Iraq to find a better opportunity for his family's future, albeit, he is the one that found his final reward. Truly, only the good die young, please say a prayer for Allan if you pray, if you don't maybe offer a good thought for a decent human being who is no longer among us...

Citizens Allied for Sane Highways: Hits $685,000 Taxpayer Bill for Marquette Interchange Web Site 11/24/2004 For more information contact Robert Trimmier (414) 232-1466 or Gretchen Schuldt (414) 331-0724 Nov. 24 -- The $685,000 the State Department of Transportation agreed to pay for the new Marquette Interchange web site is more evidence the department’s spending is out of control, Citizens Allied for Sane Highways said Wednesday. “It is just absurd,” said CASH co-chair Robert Trimmier. “The state’s broke, but WisDOT is still running a welfare system for contractors.” WisDOT agreed as part of the deal to give HNTB, a Marquette Interchange...

Those guys were real deal American warriors and this arrogant blowhard says this: CMD SGT MAJ ERIC HANEY: "There is a tremendous number of wantabes." O'REILLY (Cuts in): "Look at the guys who got strung up in Falluja. Ya know? I mean, right, I mean, you get these guys, and then they think that they're macho men, and all of a sudden they're hanging from a bridge." http://www.military.com/NewsContent/0,13319,FL_vets_040204,00.html "Two Army veterans and a former Navy SEAL were among four American contractors killed in Iraq, their bodies mutilated and dragged through the streets...Jerko 'Jerry' Zovko, 32, Michael Teague, 38, and Scott...

Here is some news from my best friend who is presently in Camp Anaconda. My best friend arrived in camp last Saturday. he has called his wife outside of Dallas twice a day (morning and night) every day since he arrived ... except today. She said she's a little worried. My friend Dave ... though not a Freeper ... is a conservative committed completed Marine (no such thing as an Ex or former Marine) who is working for Halliburton as a contractor in Iraq. He says that the base has been shelled evry day since he has been there. He...

Speaking Ill of the Dead--The Media Treatment of Nick Berg and Pat TillmanPosted by Doc Farmer Wednesday, May 19, 2004 My column last week was written before the news about the horrific slaughter of Nick Berg, an innocent American contractor. I had commented on the stupidity and cowardice of the mainstream (see also: lib/dem/soc/commie) media, their fear of us doing anything remotely discomforting in this, or any, war. However, Mr. Berg’s tragic demise brought into focus the true problem of the media. Their complicity with the enemies of America. I’ve seen the video. I made a point to watch it....

Kristinn just called me and asked me to post this thread. He just called CBS Evening News and asked them if they were going to show the militant Islamists' video of the beheading of American Nick Berg.The woman who answered the phone said that they were going to do a story on it, but they were NOT going to show the full video.He asked them, "Why not, since you had no problem showing the pictures of the Iraqis being abused by our guys in the prison. Don't you think turnabout is fair play?"The woman got mad and said, "Thank you...

Contractors caught up in Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal By Roseanne Gerin Staff Writer Two defense IT companies implicated in the Iraqi prisoner abuse scandal said today that they have not been contacted by government officials about their contractors being involved in the alleged abuse of Iraqi detainees. Recent reports by The Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times have mentioned CACI International Inc. of Arlington, Va., and Titan Corp. of San Diego as two companies that provided interrogators and interpreters at Abu Ghraib prison, approximately 20 miles west of Baghdad, where U.S. soldiers have allegedly mistreated Iraqi prisoners. A Washington...

Interesting little tidbit about the idiot demcoratic party front runner. http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=28612&spf=true John Kerry got bribe from an Indian defense contractor Lisa Getter & Tony Perry Washington, February 20: US Democratic presidential hopeful John F. Kerry sent 28 letters on behalf of an India-born San Diego defense contractor who pleaded guilty last week to illegally funneling campaign contributions to the Massachusetts senator and four other Congressmen. Members of Congress often write letters supporting constituent businesses and favor projects. But as the Democratic presidential front-runner, Kerry has promoted himself as a candidate who has never been beholden to campaign contributors and special...

SAN DIEGO (AP) - A San Diego-based defense contractor pleaded guilty Wednesday to making donations to politicians he believed would help him win contracts, including Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry and U.S. congressmen Duncan Hunter and Randy "Duke" Cunningham. Parthasarathi Majumder, the former president and chief executive of Science and Applied Technology Inc., made the contributions between 1993 to 1998 and also encouraged his friends and colleagues to do so, according to the U.S. Attorney General's Office. Majumder then reimbursed those donors more than $20,000, according to the plea agreement. U.S. election laws limit individual contributions to $1,000 to a candidate...

Boycott Blocks Construction of Abortuary in TexasSteve Brown, CNSNews.comMonday, Nov. 10, 2003 The willingness of some Texas pro-lifers to mix their personal views with their professional lives has blocked the construction of a $6.2 million abortion clinic in Austin. San Antonio-based Browning Construction, one of the largest such companies in the state, pulled out of the contract recently after a key contractors balked at the project because it was going to house a Planned Parenthood clinic where abortions were going to be performed. "We have requested that the construction contract be terminated because we are unable to secure and retain...

Aug. 20 — TIKRIT, Iraq (Reuters) - Guerrillas ambushed U.S. troops in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit in central Iraq on Wednesday, killing a contractor and wounding two soldiers, a U.S. military officer said. Major Bryan Luke did not give the nationality of the contractor. He said assault rifles were fired at a three-vehicle convoy near a market in the center of Tikrit, 110 miles north of Baghdad. Luke had initially said rocket-propelled grenades had also been fired, but later said this was not correct. He said three gunmen had fired AK-47s at the U.S. convoy and one of the...

TIKRIT, Iraq - An American civilian contractor was killed Tuesday when a remote-control bomb exploded under the truck he was driving north of Tikrit, the U.S. military said. The contractor was employed by Kellogg Brown & Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton, a Houston-based oilfield-services and construction company. Halliburton, the former company of Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites), has major contracts for reconstruction in both Iraq (news - web sites) and Afghanistan (news - web sites). Maj. Brian Luke, of the 4th Infantry Division, said the five- vehicle convoy was traveling from Baghdad when it was attacked. Insurgents...

Approved Contractors for BAA-02-08: Total Information Awareness Source: Documents obtained by EPIC under the Freedom of Information Act. Contractor, Control #, Protect Title, and Defense Contract have been taken from a list of contractors. This list is available for download, in Portable Document Format (PDF), in four parts: [Part 1: 5.6MB] [Part 2: 6.4MB] [Part 3: 5.0MB] [Part 4: 3.5MB]). Contract Date and Amount have been taken from forms describing the details of each contract awarded. These individual forms have been linked (as PDF files) from each budgeted amount shown below. Contractor Control # Project Title Defense Contact Date...

Click here for printable version of storyE-mail this article to a friend Record highWest Virginia contractor wins largest single lottery jackpotThursday December 26, 2002 By Gavin McCormickThe Associated Press A 55-year-old West Virginia water and sewer contractor has won the $314.9 million Powerball jackpot, the largest single lottery jackpot in history.Andrew Jackson Whittaker Jr. received a $10 million advance check from Gov. Bob Wise Thursday at a news conference. The balance of Whittaker's $314.9 million won't be presented for another two weeks.Whittaker said he originally thought he had lost the jackpot because the numbers came up wrong on the televised...

<p>FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — A defense contractor has been charged with delivering spare parts without critical heat treatment, to save money. The omission could have caused plane crashes and weapon breakdowns, prosecutors said Thursday.</p> <p>Parts supplied by Damon Industries Inc. that lacked the special hardening treatment were for F-18 and F-15 fighter jets, C-135 cargo planes, Cobra helicopters, Bradley armored personnel carriers, howitzers, mortars and .50-caliber machines guns, rifles and Navy ships, prosecutors said.</p>