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FEMA relief rife with abuse, fraud, report says (Katrina Fraud)
MSNBC ^ | 12 JUN 2006 | Chip Reid

Posted on 06/13/2006 4:01:53 PM PDT by Libertarian444

WASHINGTON - As requests for emergency assistance poured in after Hurricane Katrina, one applicant listed as his address the Greenwood Cemetery in New Orleans. FEMA promptly issued a check for $2,358 for rental assistance.

That's just one of thousands of examples of alleged fraud and abuse described in a new report by the investigative arm of congress — abuse that cost taxpayers about $1 billion.

One person applied for aid 13 times, using 13 bogus addresses, and received a total of $139,000.

The report says FEMA didn't even try to verify the identity of people who applied for aid by phone and says FEMA's fraud controls are “weak or nonexistent.”

More than 2,000 people applied for aid from prison and received about $12 million.

The report also finds that FEMA debit cards, which were supposed to be used for necessities, were used for a week-long Caribbean vacation, a $600 tab at a gentleman's club and a visit to Hooters, which included a $200 bottle of champagne.

(Excerpt) Read more at msnbc.msn.com ...


TOPICS: Breaking News; Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: abuse; fema; fraud; govwatch; gummintgiveaways; katrina; outofcontrolspending; porkaddicts; sexchange; spendingspree; stopmebeforeispend; taxes; waste
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To: Libertarian444

I'm shocked....SHOCKED, I tell you!! (/sarcasm)


81 posted on 06/15/2006 5:13:19 AM PDT by blinachka (Vechnaya Pamyat Daddy... xoxo)
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To: Libertarian444

Gee...you insist that a Federal agency do things outside its jurisdiction, and look what you get!

Of course, I have seen very little coverage of the fact that the Louisiana officials were named in the report, too.


82 posted on 06/15/2006 6:14:52 AM PDT by Gondring (If "Conservatives" now wants to "conserve" our Constitution away, then I must be a Preservative!)
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To: John Lenin
This is Bush's fault for throwing money out the window like he did.

Exactly. I would hope this would make him think twice about his Big Government ideals.

83 posted on 06/15/2006 6:15:36 AM PDT by Gondring (If "Conservatives" now want to "conserve" our Constitution away, then I must be a Preservative!)
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To: Rapscallion
What I think is that we would do better without FEMA. Tell the states that emergencies are their responsibility.

FEMA did that, and were ready to step in to assist in coordination. When it turned out that LA officials had mismanaged things so much, Bush grabbed the blame himself and made it seem like FEMAs role was to have been there! Well, if FEMA had gone in originally, they would have rightfully complained about Federal interference in their jurisdiction.

84 posted on 06/15/2006 6:17:23 AM PDT by Gondring (If "Conservatives" now want to "conserve" our Constitution away, then I must be a Preservative!)
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To: generally
What happened to insurance? Whose fault is it when someone is uninsured? Not the taxpayers'.

Especially living in an area that has had great warnings for many years about the potential of this occurring. But then they tax me--who can't afford to own a house--to build houses for people who just waste the money away in a floodplain again!

85 posted on 06/15/2006 6:18:59 AM PDT by Gondring (If "Conservatives" now want to "conserve" our Constitution away, then I must be a Preservative!)
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To: IronJack

No, this isn't a surprise but these stories of FEMA fraud were rampant months ago on conservative news sites. These stories are not new. Why are we just now seeing them in the MSM? Could it be to just show more proof of GOP mismanagement closer to the 2006 election? Nothing happens by chance in DC.


86 posted on 06/15/2006 9:34:01 AM PDT by conservative blonde (Conservative Blonde)
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The American system is based on the honor system shared by the middle class. The government can not prevent most cases of corruption unless the people are honorable and decent.

The Katrina "victims" were the kind of people who live by different rules than mainstream society... the kind of people used to collect government hand outs and hang out all day in the 'hood, the kind of people who bitch about illegal aliens rebuilding New Orleans but refuse to get their hands dirty.

87 posted on 06/15/2006 10:56:01 AM PDT by george wythe
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To: Wingy

My parents received a loan from the SBA back in the '70s to repair their flood damaged home. They had to record every cent they spent in a record book so it could be checked.


88 posted on 06/15/2006 11:54:46 AM PDT by Retired Chemist
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To: jw777
Congress must take blame for fraud they said get the money to victim's now. But where is the people who did this and do they need to be blamed for taking money they didn't have any right to? Go after all of them and make them work off money they took. Because we all know they no longer have the money.
My daughter works at hospital and people there laughed at her for not getting in line for hand out. She let them all know she was not raised to take thing she did earn or did not belong to her.
If you want to see how dishonest people are let it be known something is free. I'm all for helping those who truly lost everything they have but I blame the people for the wrong doing. And someday they will have to answer for it.
Just because something is free doesn't mean it right to take it. As a old lady told me many time "You better do what is right because you are going to be in life here after a lot longer than you will on earth" and I have never forgot that. So they will be judged someday. It makes me ashamed of people from my State (Mississippi) to take from from those who lost everything. I wonder how they sleep at night.
89 posted on 06/15/2006 2:28:20 PM PDT by ducks1944 (GOD Bless the USA .)
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To: george wythe
The American system is based on the honor system shared by the middle class.

Yet we're told that those middle-class "bourgeois" values are a bad thing, that they exist to disenfranchise the proletariat and to perpetuate a stagnant status quo. On the other hand, the reprehensible conduct of the scammers and frauds is earthy, rebellious, exciting.

In the Marxist world, good literally is bad, and vice is a virtue.

90 posted on 06/15/2006 3:31:26 PM PDT by IronJack
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To: Tijeras_Slim

And this surprises, who? I saw this one coming the day they started issuing debit cards.


91 posted on 06/15/2006 3:35:10 PM PDT by SAMS (Nobody loves a soldier until the enemy is at the gate; Army Wife & Marine Mom)
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To: ducks1944

I agree 100%. Prosectue to the fullest extent of the law. But, if you think about it. Most of the New Orleans displaced were already welfare and handout babies anyways. Not all, of course, but a good many were already receiving freebies and they could care less who had to pay for their theft.


92 posted on 06/15/2006 3:52:24 PM PDT by jw777
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To: Ramius
Mere animals would have behaved better.

And they did.

I did animal rescue in NOLA, and it was amazing to watch as 5 dogs and 3 cats -- none of which knew each other -- could be piled into the back seat of a sedan and they didn't kill each other because they KNEW they had been rescued from a disaster. They knew they had a choice to either "deal with the opposite species in the back seat of this car or perish on the streets of NOLA." In every case that I know of, these frightened animals of predator/prey species got along fine in the midst of the rescue.

93 posted on 06/15/2006 5:19:30 PM PDT by BagCamAddict (Prayers for the victims - human and animal - of Katrina and Rita)
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To: BagCamAddict; HairOfTheDog

Hah...! what an interesting vignette... thanks for sharing it.


94 posted on 06/15/2006 7:03:11 PM PDT by Ramius (Buy blades for war fighters: freeper.the-hobbit-hole.net --> 1400 knives and counting!)
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To: Ramius

You're welcome. It was quite an amazing sight. If only humans could behave half as well, eh?


95 posted on 06/15/2006 10:38:34 PM PDT by BagCamAddict (Prayers for the victims - human and animal - of Katrina and Rita)
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To: IronJack

Of course it's no surprise. I'm pretty sure much of the fraud was done by the people we saw screaming and crying at the Dome, you remember them don't you, the ones who were told to leave the city because a BIG storm was coming and there would be no way to help them!!!! The same people who got free apartments all this time while the media tells us what a failure the President is. What a disgusting bunch of whiners. Oh, never mind, I get sick just thinking about it.


96 posted on 06/15/2006 10:41:26 PM PDT by 2rightsleftcoast
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To: 2rightsleftcoast
These were people that were on welfare before the storm, that have never worked a day in their lives, that were petty criminals and crackheads and malingerers from the day they dropped. Then, a fortuitous disaster befalls them, and the generous American people, either directly or through their appointed agents, open the doors to the vault.

What do you think comes next? And why would any government program serving this dubious clientele not be constructed so as to prevent these kinds of fraud? Because in the world of socialism -- and that's exactly what the Katrina relief effort was -- the only important thing is that you throw money at the problem.

97 posted on 06/16/2006 6:37:22 AM PDT by IronJack
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To: Bob

Ahhh, carter again, I should have known.


98 posted on 06/16/2006 7:39:21 PM PDT by Not now, Not ever! (This tag-line is temporarily closed for remodeling)
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To: Libertarian444

oh, pleeeeeeese spare me.

The media crucified this president over his "lack of response"

Now, naturally, they are now trying to fry him for all of the totally predictable waste and insane overspending for doing everything possible to move a systemically slow government at warp speed to help. Yup, the gov. threw money at everything that moved; guilty as charged.


99 posted on 06/16/2006 8:17:21 PM PDT by Wiseghy ("You want to break this army? Then break your word to it.")
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To: Prince Caspian

No


100 posted on 06/19/2006 4:00:04 PM PDT by no-to-illegals (yep, that's gonna work <sarc>)
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