20 September 2006
BushCheneyCo is Fleecing the Federal Treasury and Risking American Lives for Profit
TPMmuckraker September 18, 2006 02:10 PM
Halliburton to Wounded Employee: You'll Get a Medal -- If You Don't
Sue - By Justin Rood - September 18, 2006, 2:10 PM
Halliburton will help its combat-zone employees get the honors and recognition they deserve -- if they promise not to sue the company. That's according to new documents released today by Senate Democrats. Ray Stannard was a truck driver in Iraq for Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg Brown and Root. In 2003, he was part of a fuel convoy that was ambushed by insurgents. Seven Americans died in the attack and 26 were injured, including Stannard. He is suing the company.
"The streets in Basra and Baghdad are sure to erupt in joy in the same way the throngs in Kabul greeted the Americans." -- Vice President Dick Cheney, August 2002.
On Monday, I watched on CSPAN the Democrats-only hearing (because no Republican committee chairman will hold any) which was the source of the documents referred to above. One of the witnessess was another former truck driver for KBR who had driven the same road earlier that same day. He claims he specifically advised the KBR contactor--prior to departure of the convoy that was attacked later when seven drivers were killed and driver Ray Stannard was wounded--not to send any more trucks on that road, that somebody would get killed.
An attorney for one of the plaintiffs said there are currently over 50 civil suits alleging fraud, overcharging and other malfeasence pertaining to KBR, yet the Justice Dept. has not filed a single charge. Justice has instead undertaken investigations, thus sealing all evidence the plaintiffs are seeking. Sealed evidence in cases pertinent to investigations is supposed to be unsealed after 60 days. Apparently, Justice has sought and received numerous extensions, effectively witholding the requested evidence for upwards to 2 years. (Read: Alberto Gonzales, Attorney General at: Barnum & Bushly Circus.)
Further, the attorney said KBR claims it is not subject to civil suit in as much as it is sovereign, meaning KBR is an entity of the Department of Defense, ergo, the United States government. He stated that KBR representatives in Houston have said that they have "friends in high places," which they allege substantiates their claim of sovereignty. Wonder who they could be?
However, the private, cost-plus contract for fuel transportation awarded--no bid---to KBR was subcontracted through one of their subsidiaries in the Cayman Islands, a tax haven country. Thus, Halliburton/KBR is not only attempting to avoid prosecution with their claim of sovereignty, they are avoiding taxes on revenue earned from the contract.
A former Democratic House member on the same panel said he had asked the White House two years ago to see the contract, but never did. Why? Because the White House stonewalled.
In another Democrats-only hearing on CSPAN regarding congressional oversight, one witness was Clark Kent Irving, a former Bush recess appointee, who later was not confirmed because Democrat Joe Liebermann and one of the lady 'Publican senators from Maine blocked him. Irving said, along with others, that in all areas oversight by congress of the executive branch is virtually non-existant. Another witness whose name was Denis McDonough, or something like that, said quote: "(Congressional) oversight of intelligence is fundamentally broken."
This is just the tip of the iceberg. Other witnesses testified that KBR administrators considered requests for services from troops to be an annoyance, yet overtly bragged about enoromous profits being made in Iraq. KBR (a.k.a. BushCheneyCo) is blatantly fleecing the Federal treasury as their own personal cash cow, and and knowingly risking American lives purely for profit, and nobody does anything about it. Hopefully, Senators Dorgan and Durbin will continue to attempt to lasso them dogies, and skin 'em alive.
Strangely enough, on Tuesday, Dorgan and Durbin both spoke on the floor complaining about lack of oversight of fraud and profiteering by the do-nothing Republican congress. Afterwards, some red state Republican, I think the junior from Montana, got up to speak, ostensibly about progress in the area of border protection and illegal immigration (i.e. the War on Mexican Citizens), but pre-empted himself to respond to Dorgan and Durbin, and defend the Republican Congress claiming every piece of legislation they try to pass is filibustered by the Democrats. I'm still scratching my head as to how filibustering a bill on the floor of the Senate equates to not holding committee hearings to determine if our tax dollars are being spent as intended.
But where have I heard this story before? Oh yeah, 18 months ago!
Lopez Hodes Files Lawsuit Against KBR Halliburton for Wrongful Death of Contract Employee in Fuel Convoy Massacre
Newport Beach, CA—March 28, 2005—In the first of several lawsuits arising out of Halliburton's civilian-driven truck convoy of April 9, 2004 in Iraq, during which driver Tommy Hamill was taken hostage and six other drivers were killed by enemy insurgents, plaintiff in a California civil action entitled April Johnson, as the surviving daughter of decedent truck driver Tony Johnson vs. Halliburton and its subsidiary Kellogg Brown & Root, et al., alleges that Halliburton/KBR deployed its civilian truck drivers into a hostile active war zone despite knowledge from intelligence sources that there existed a substantial certainty the civilian drivers, moving in U.S. military vehicles, would be ambushed by Iraqi insurgents and killed or seriously injured. The drivers were following orders from Halliburton to deliver fuel to Baghdad International Airport ("BIAP").
According to the lawsuit, Halliburton intentionally sent the convoy as an enemy "decoy," in U.S. military camouflage vehicles, to ensure the safe arrival and delivery of a second H-KBR fuel convoy. As stated in earlier news reports, the lawsuit alleges that the doomed convoy was deployed for the sole purpose of KBR fulfilling its quotas of daily fuel deliveries, apparently specified under its U.S. government contract, without regard for the lives, safety, and well-being of its unarmed civilian employees.
The civil action filed on behalf of April Johnson, by the California-based Newport Beach law firm of Lopez, Hodes, Restaino, Milman & Skikos, alleges that Halliburton ordered the convoy in which Johnson was a driver, to take what was later discovered by the drivers to be a longer and extremely dangerous route to the airport's North Gate, along a highway that had been designated by both U. S. Military Forces and Halliburton/KBR's Central Command as a "black" zone – actively engaged in enemy attacks and military combat. Halliburton knew when it deployed its civilian drivers that that portion of the highway was to be avoided at all costs, especially by unarmed civilians driving U.S. military tankers. While Johnson's convoy was ordered to drive military camouflaged vehicles, ensuring the convoy would appear as a U.S. military operation and an enemy target, another KBR fuel delivery convoy simultaneously deployed to BIAP, was provided with European made Volvo and Mercedes civilian vehicles. This second convoy was directed to embark upon a shorter, more direct route and arrived at BIAP safely and without incident.
Halliburton knowingly failed to inform the drivers in Hamill's convoy before their departure of the "Black" status alert and instead informed the drivers that the road conditions were at a low "amber" status. Prior to being sent to Iraq, Halliburton assured the civilian drivers that they would not be driving "military-type " vehicles to transport fuel or supplies, as it was known that there existed a high level of insurgent hostility toward the U.S. military presence in Iraq.
In Houston, Texas, December 2003, Halliburton, KBR, and Service Employee's International, Inc. ("SEII") (Halliburton's Cayman Island subsidiary) recruited civilian employees from the U.S. to work in Iraq under assurances that the civilian workers would be placed in "100% safe" working conditions and engaged in peaceful rebuilding missions...
Receiving nothing more than hardhat helmets, bulky bulletproof vests, and outdated radio equipment, the unarmed civilian drivers, led by Tommy Hamill, unaware that their employer had planned and intended their tragic fate, boarded their unarmored, U.S. military camouflage-painted tankers, and departed to the airport along a route known by their employer and the U.S. military to be the location of constant enemy attacks...
To borrow an expression from Boll Weevil Jesse Helms: Gawd-a'mitey-dam! It only took 18 months to get to Capitol Hill.
After November, I don't care if a single piece of legislation is passed or rescinded for the next two years. We need to start taking back our government, and there needs to be a snowstorm of subpoenas and an inundation of investigations to do so.
JR Ford
UP (Unsubstantiated Press)
St. Petersburg, Fl.
sixtimeseven@aol.com
"If you are going to catch a 400 pound Black Mamba, someone is going to have to crawl into the Aardvark Burrow after him." -- JR Ford, Mar 2005.
