Another Goss Aide Is Linked to Military Contracting Scandals
Investigators are looking into ties between one of the outgoing CIA Director's right hand men and a defense contractor at the center of the Duke Cunningham lobbying scandal
By TIMOTHY J. BURGER/WASHINGTON
Posted Wednesday, May. 10, 2006
An old Central Intelligence Agency hand who was close to outgoing Director Porter Goss was previously a paid consultant to one of the defense contractors who allegedly bribed ex-Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, according to government documents and a person familiar with the matter. The financial link between Brant Bassett — who served two stints at the CIA and recommended the controversial Kyle "Dusty" Foggo for a top agency post — and defense contractor Brent Wilkes could prove a further embarrassment to Goss in the wake of what sources in and out of government say are investigations by the CIA inspector general and the Justice Department into Wilkes' ties to the Agency, as well as to Congress and the Pentagon.
Bassett was paid $5,000 in May 2000 as a consultant to ADCS Corp., a company headed by Wilkes, Foggo's friend since childhood, according to disclosure forms Bassett filed when he was a House intelligence committee aide to Goss while the former Congressman was the panel's Republican chairman. Bassett was not working for the CIA at the time of the payment. Still, it may not look good for yet another of Goss's right hand men to be associated with Wilkes — whom prosecutors allege, in Cunningham's guilty plea, provided more than $600,000 of the $2.4 million in bribes that landed Cunningham a more than eight-year federal prison sentence in March.
As part of its mushrooming Cunningham probe, the Justice Department has been looking into whether Foggo received improper gifts such as lavish travel from Wilkes, according to a source familiar with the case. Wilkes' business held at least one contract with the CIA as well as technology contracts with the Pentagon, according to U.S. officials and other sources. An investigator for the House intelligence committee is also scrutinizing Bassett's link to Wilkes, according to government disclosures obtained by TIME.
When Goss became CIA director in late 2004, he brought Bassett back for a second stint at the agency as a consultant in the directorate of operations, according to a person who spoke on behalf of Bassett. Bassett knew Foggo from the days when both served in the CIA's directorate of operations, according to one official.
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http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1192766,00.html?promoid=rss_nation
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