Pentagon Paid $999,798 to Ship Two 19-Cent Washers to Texas

[DeSwiss]

Pentagon Paid $999,798 to Ship Two 19-Cent Washers to Texas

Tony Capaccio
August 16, 2007



(Bloomberg) -- A small South Carolina parts supplier collected about $20.5 million over six years from the Pentagon for fraudulent shipping costs, including $998,798 for sending two 19-cent washers to a Texas base, U.S. officials said.

The company also billed and was paid $455,009 to ship three machine screws costing $1.31 each to Marines in Habbaniyah, Iraq, and $293,451 to ship an 89-cent split washer to Patrick Air Force Base in Cape Canaveral, Florida, Pentagon records show.

The owners of C&D Distributors in Lexington, South Carolina -- twin sisters -- exploited a flaw in an automated Defense Department purchasing system: bills for shipping to combat areas or U.S. bases that were labeled ``priority'' were usually paid automatically, said Cynthia Stroot, a Pentagon investigator.

C&D's fraudulent billing started in 2000, Stroot, the Defense Criminal Investigative Service's chief agent in Raleigh, North Carolina, said in an interview. ``As time went on they got more aggressive in the amounts they put in.''

http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20070816/pl_bloomberg/ajkoyhuchw0m

*** - Shipping washers can be extremely tricky, you see? And the 19¢ variety of washer are the hardest to ship of all. Care has to be taken when packaging these things so that they don't get scratched and dinged. And if there's one thing that shows support for the troops more than anything, is the visage of a pristine, shiny washer without scratches and dings. Makes me get all choked up..... right here {pats wallet}.....

[Greyskye]

1. and i thought that toilets for planes were expensive!

You can bet that these aren't the only people gaming the system. :grr:

[DeSwiss]

25. And toilets with washers.....

....PRICELESS.

[KansDem]

2. KYRIIIST!!! I would have done it for half that price...

...and I would have delivered them personally--assuming I could get them through the airport metal detectators...

[DeSwiss]

26. Well I.....

...would have done it for half that price -- less $1. So there. :P

[KansDem]

30. You see? YOU SEE??? Capitalism *does* work!!!

Do to our bidding war, the Pentagon would have saved not just $499,899 but $499,900! :party:

[sutz12]

3. Free market capitalism....gotta love it. Entrepeneurship at its finest.

:sarcasm:

Did I really need that?

[BOSSHOG]

8. Conservative republican voodoo economics pure and simple

Who the fuck needs government oversight? Of anything?

[DeSwiss]

28. The only "government oversight" we seem to be getting now....

...is where they're training the spy satellites on us.



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x1593583

[DeSwiss]

27. "Entrepeneurship at its finest..."

....except I think when you're successful, you're supposed to retire with beaucoup money in the bank, a villa in Majorca and a cabin in the Catskills. Not a 6' x 11' cell in Levenworth.

But hey, to each his/her own......

[shain from kane]

4. Bush* could have slipped them in his pocket, and delivered them on one of his vacation trips.

[GreenPartyVoter]

7. LOL

[gatorboy]

5. Insane spending on the Republican's watch????

*gasp* Say it ain't so! :eyes:

[mediaman007]

6. I suppose that they get to keep the money...

I guess that's the way the "free market" operates. Where's Gonzo when you need him?

Perhaps this company will get the Medal of Freedom from Bush*.

[DeSwiss]

18. Only if they promise.....

....not to ever, ever, ever, REALLY, REALLY, Scouts-honor -- do it again.

[lpbk2713]

9. Must be friends of Strom Thurmond.

Had to be.

[stellanoir]

10. You got some sort of problem with that. . .

why that's just plain unpatriotic.

/sarcasm

Unbelievable really.

And this would be two mere washers on the iceberg of the neocons' legacy of "loot and waste."

Much preferred "tax and spend" and some available services. . .such as. . .bridge inspectors.

Didn't you. . .?

[DeSwiss]

20. "You got some sort of problem with that. . ."

....Oh, no, no, no, nooooooooo. Anything for the troops.

Ya see, these was special washers. They was SURGE WASHERS. The very best kind. Maybe that's why the Surge hasn't gone so well. They must be using badly damaged washers???

:sarcasm:

:rofl:

[AtomicKitten]

11. that's what I call fuzzy math

[GreenTea]

12. You know they want BushCo's war for profit to continue!

Our billions of dollars we pay in taxes going to these same pro war corporations, to invade Iraq & Iran while their media corporations feeds us propaganda, fear & lies each day!

[KansDem]

13. But remember, folks, we don't have enough money for universal health care...

Now we know why...

[Beetwasher]

14. I Very Much Doubt This Was Merely "Fraudulent Billing"

It was more likely money laundering for Bushco. black ops. I'd be willing to bet this money found it's way to various PAC's, lobbyists etc.

[Breeze54]

15. And are these motherfuckers also R's??????

:grr: Hang 'em high!!!!!!! :grr:

They are in federal prison now, aren't they??

----------------

snip-->

http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20070816/pl_bloomberg/ajkoyhuchw0m

``C&D was a rogue contractor,'' Stroot said. While other questionable billing has been uncovered, nothing came close to C&D's, she said. The next-highest contractor billed $2 million in questionable transport costs, she said.

Guilty Pleas

C&D and two of its officials were barred in December from receiving federal contracts. A federal judge in Columbia, South Carolina, today accepted the guilty plea of the company and one sister, Charlene Corley, to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of conspiracy to launder money, Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin McDonald said.

Corley, 46, faces a maximum prison sentence of 20 years on each count and will be sentenced in the near future, McDonald said in a telephone interview from Columbia. Stroot said her sibling died last year.

Corley didn't immediately return a phone message left on her answering machine at her office in Lexington. Her attorney, Gregory Harris, didn't immediately a phone call placed to his office in Columbia.

Stroot said the Pentagon hopes to recoup most of the $20.5 million by auctioning homes, beach property, jewelry and ``high- end automobiles'' that the sisters spent the money on.

``They took a lot of vacations,'' she said.

[DeSwiss]

29. Republicans??? Yes.

And twin sisters. And with the Repuke's committment to family values, I'm sure the judge will try and keep the family together.

At least this is my hope and prayer....

[Breeze54]

31. I thought one of the sisters was deceased?

You mean they even collected $$ in her name and she's dead??

:wtf:

[DeSwiss]

34. From the article: "Stroot said her sibling died last year...."

...but then they said the same thing about Ken Lay too. I don't believe anything that these bastards say. Not until I see a body and a video of the autopsy.

And the little pinkie finger. I want that too....

:rofl:

[Breeze54]

36. "Proof of ...er...um...Death" ?

You a sic, sic person!! :P :sarcasm:

They said they went on a lot of vacations!! :rofl:

[blogslut]

37. Even more dramatic

The partner was Charlene's twin sister Darlene, who killed herself after the Feds nailed her:

Woman Pleads Guilty to Taking $20 Million from Government; Twin Takes Own Life

(Columbia) - The United States Attorney's Office announced Thursday that a 47-year-old Lexington woman pleaded guilty to defrauding the U.S. Department of Defense of more than $20 Million in shipping costs.

Attorney Reginald I. Lloyd said 47-year-old Charlene Corley of Lexington, as well as the company she partially owned, C&D Disributors pled guilty in federal court to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering.

<snip>

Officials say Darlene Wooten committed suicide at her Lexington County lake house last October, after being contacted by federal investigators about the fraud...

link: http://www.wltx.com/news/story.aspx?storyid=52580

[Breeze54]

39. Wow! Thanks for clearing that up.

I guess the guilt of the stealing and the fear of prison got to her.

[Vinca]

16. Sheesh - I would have hand delivered them for a half million.

I've got to get the Pentagon to give me a contract for something . . . anything.

[karlrschneider]

17. Hell, they could've punched holes in 2 nickels!

:silly:

[lumberjack_jeff]

19. Why does Bloomberg hate the troops?

I'm sure that that 19-cent washer saved a soldiers life, and that $1 million bucks was a small price to pay to get it to 'em.

Is :sarcasm: really necessary?

[tridim]

21. How ironic, I just bought 25 of those exact washers on Monday at Lowes

Total cost: $1.97 . I only needed 12, but 12 of them cost $2.50. Maybe 2 would have cost almost a million bucks?

[Larry Ogg]

22. I’m sure you have it all wrong...

These were obviously the special type of washers that are used on the "Chromium plated fully eliminated hexagon rotational surface compression devices", similar to the ones that the pentagon was buying for seven thousand dollars in 1980.

If you would just take the time to consider that, "The angle of the dangle is proportional to the heat of the meat times the mass of the taxpayer’s ass combined with 27 years of inflation," that price is right with in the ballpark of what was once called the fleecing of America.

So yes we are getting screwed, but at least the screwing is within the lines of inflation, therefore some people, like republicans, might conceder that we are not being overly screwed.

Just a little something to think about before you get all upset…

:shrug::banghead::wtf:

Now you can get upset... :grr:

[DeSwiss]

32. No, no, no.....

...when you start talking "Chromium plated fully eliminated hexagon rotational surface compression devices", well hey. You're really talking BIG BUCKS then. Shipping for these babies is at least twice the cost!!!

You see, they're also "freshness-dated."


"Well, hell. There goes the college fund...."

[Larry Ogg]

38. Dam right shipping cost went up, they probably had to bubble rap a 747… n/t

[WI_DEM]

23. That really makes me steaming mad!

and they pick on poor people when the military-industrial complex wastes this kind of money!

[CGowen]

24. No wonder trillions are missing n/t

[DU GrovelBot]

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[DeSwiss]

35. Hey there ol' DU GrovelBot my friend.....

...its nice of you to stop by the thread. Pull up a chair and grab a beer. Or a can of WD40. Now, I've donated already, and so far I haven't heard not one word from Homeland Security like I thought I would. Wait a minute..... hold on.... someone's pulling up outside my house.....

Don't worry, it was just the UPS guy with my latest DVD: "Republican Porn 1900 - to-date." I can't wait unil I get to the Chester Arthur segment!

But now you others out there!!! Yeah you guys. Give until it hurts!!!

PLEASE!!!!!!!

:D

[Junkdrawer]

40. Haliburton opens the loophole...others follow....

Cheney an pals get to keep their money. As for therest...

[Blue_Tires]

41. lol

i remember a time when it was the repubs that were solidly against runaway spending, and not the perpetrators of it

[DeSwiss]

42. Ahhhhhhh.......

...for the good ol' day$ of $kinflint$, fi$cal con$ervative$, and Rockefeller Republican$.

[Beaverhausen]

43. K&R

I missed this yesterday. This is fucked up.