E-mails show KBR feared casualties before deadly attack

[maddezmom]

Source: Houston Chronicle

KBR security personnel expected casualties the night before six civilian drivers were killed and others injured in an Iraqi ambush, but sent the convoy into a combat zone anyway, according to e-mails presented in a Houston federal court Wednesday.

“There is tons of intel stating tomorrow will be another bad day,” wrote George Seagle, director of security for KBR government operations, the night before the April 9, 2004, attacks. In the e-mail presented in court, he suggested KBR halt convoys for the next day, the first anniversary of the day Baghdad fell in the U.S.-led invasion.

In a flurry of e-mails, many held under seal in the court case for the last year, various KBR employees discussed their concern about possible loss of life.

Seagle responded that he understood the pressures of big politics and contract issues might cause the fuel-delivering convoys to be sent out anyway but “we will get people injured or killed tomorrow.”

And before the ambush but on the same day, Keith Richard, chief of the trucking operation in Iraq, e-mailed KBR's Houston headquarters saying, “we need to expedite the hiring of drivers. We need drivers in theater soon.”

Plaintiff lawyer Scott Allen presented the e-mails in a hearing before U.S. District Judge Gray Miller to determine whether a jury should hear three lawsuits against KBR.


Read more: http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/6727784.html

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another article about this in Sept '07

'L.A. Times' Defies KBR, Publishes Probe on Deaths of Truckers


Published: September 03, 2007 10:55 PM ET

LOS ANGELES Senior managers for defense contractor KBR Inc. (KBR) rejected the advice of their own security advisers in April 2004, ordering their truck drivers to speed through a five-mile combat zone in Iraq to deliver jet fuel to the U.S. military, according to a newspaper investigation.

At least six civilian drivers and two U.S. soldiers died following that decision, raising anew questions about the military's reliance on civilian contractors in war zones.

The families and some survivors of the doomed convoy are suing the Houston- based company and are requesting a federal investigation of KBR's role in the incident.

The Los Angeles Times reviewed emails cited in a May 22 letter the plaintiffs' lawyers sent to the U.S. Justice Department. The newspaper also interviewed KBR truck drivers and former military officials and reviewed internal memos, emails, court-sealed depositions and a U.S. Army report about the deaths.

more:http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003634296