The next big question should be...”Was the new equipment actually purchased or did the money go to friends of Murtha?”
House Democrats on Tuesday stopped a Republican plan to force a campaign finance inquiry that likely would have investigated several influential Democrats. It was the eighth time since late February that the Republican move was halted.
One of the biggest recipients has been the chairman of the defense appropriations subcommittee, Rep. John Murtha of Pennsylvania. The vote was 215-182 to stop consideration of a GOP resolution to initiate a House ethics committee inquiry. It called for an investigation into campaign contributions to House lawmakers by recipients of pet project money and their lobbyists. ... (Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
According to the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks political money: three lawmakers received huge amounts of political donations from PMA lobbyists,their clients, and the companies it has represented since 1989.....Murtha collected $2.37 million, Visclosky collected $1.36 million; Moran, $997,348.
There are any number of agencies that investigate government fraud (listed here).
POSSIBLE CRIMES Government fraud, conspiracy to steal; theft of public property and official records; money laundering; US postal fraud; electronic fraud.
REPORT TAX FRAUD AND TAX LAW VIOLATIONS HERE:
IRS TOLL-FREE 1-800-829-0433----you may remain anonymous.
EMAIL----OAAG.Tax@tax.USDOJ.gov
The IRS should determine if all taxes were paid (stolen money is taxable).
IRS TOLL-FREE 1-800-829-0433—-you may remain anonymous when reporting tax fraud.
Fiduciary negligence; signing off on falsified official documents is reported here :
EMAIL askDOJ@usdoj.gov
FBI TIP PAGE http://tips.fbi.gov/ (you may remain anonymous)
If publicly-held companies are involved
EMAIL enforcement@SEC.gov
Report possible campaign finance fraud
EMAIL Federal Election Commission
I will suggest to you the method as to how this works. They get the money and they get a source from where they can buy “x”. The source where they buy the gear...is in on the deal as well.
So to the items that they will buy: high precision rifles, military assault gear, quad-bikes, night-vision goggles (normal end & extremely high end), boats, digital cameras, and ammo.
Call it toys....call it whatever you want. The boys will hault the stuff in, and in six to twelve months...realize that half the stuff has no value in their operations or just sit in the storage shed. You have to be careful about quickly turning an item and selling it on the open market. Most market their excess equipment after a year, so no grant problems exist if some did do a audit.
The high-end stuff...like the night-vision goggles are mandated to be sold to only law enforcement agencies.
My hometown...which shall be left unnamed....got funds from homeland security to buy a speedboat. This was supposed to be used to protect the local dam (over four miles away from the city) from terrorists. The boys typically use it for alcohol issues on the lake. They rake in around $5k a weekend for alcohol violations in the summer. They hired another cop...now a pretty big police force operation (four full-timers) for a town of barely 800 people.