Pentagon Paid $998,798 to Ship Two 19-Cent Washers

[rodeodance]

Source: (Bloomberg)




Pentagon Paid $998,798 to Ship Two 19-Cent Washers

Tony Capaccio 1 hour, 5 minutes ago

Aug. 16 (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 an Army base in Texas, 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 and two of its officials were barred in December from receiving federal contracts. Today, a federal judge in Columbia, South Carolina, 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.

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20070816/pl_bloomberg/a_piz20xqxeu;_ylt=AhYOMNp6hwXsMfIvSP1o_Yus0NUE

[FormerDittoHead]

1. Why are these stories of gov't waste always about the military, yet its budget is never cut? n/t

[ThomCat]

11. Because the lobbyists and their backers make damned sure

that if even $0.01 is cut from the pentagon budget everyone involved will be smeared in the media as traitors who want to gut the military and turn our country over to our enemies. x(

I agree, we need a full top-to-bottom audit of everything going on through the pentagon, and we need to chop off some hands, figuratively speaking.

[saigon68]

42. Puppet Peter Pace needs his Putz cut off

What an ass clown running a Criminal Organization

Too bad no seniors need prescriptions

Ass Clown military licking the Chimps rear end

[barbtries]

39. not only that,

but is there a plan to return our money to us?

[DUlover2909]

40. Why don't I ever hear this question in the debates?

The US spends more on defense than Russia, China, western Europe, eastern Europe, Africa, South America, Canada, Central America, the middle east, Australia, ok-ok EVERYBODY ELSE COMBINED! What would you do to reduce our enormous defense budget and bring it in line with what is commensurate with our actual needs?

[ClintonTyree]

56. Anyone speaking up would be....

labeled "soft on terror" or "anti-military". The GOP would have a field day, cutting anyone to ribbons if they even suggested a cut in military spending. 'Gotta have a strong military, you know? :eyes: What could be stronger than a half-million dollar washer? :sarcasm:

Cut the Pentagon's budget by 20% across the board. Make them accountable, for once, for the distribution of their budget. There's not one ounce of monetary discipline in the Pentagon because they KNOW no one will ever question their spending and they ALWAYS get HUGE increases in their budget each year, without question.

The biggest waste of spending in the United States each year and people treat it like it's actually necessary. BAH! :grr:

FEED THE WAR MACHINE! What an asshole country we are!

[Up2Late]

57. The most infuriating part about the DoD is that their literally is no way of auditing them...

...several Inspectors General have said that their Accounting is so screwed up that at this point it's just totally impossible, probably because it's just so big.:argh:

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

59. Probably because it is intentional.

:argh:

[CanonRay]

2. I'll bet the ranch that both of them are Repugs. Anybody know?

[loudsue]

8. Probably republican DONORS, as well....they get all the contracts,

and they don't have any compunctions about stealing from the government they all say they hate.

:kick:

[closeupready]

3. How commonplace is this type of thing?

n/t

[indepat]

4. A bit more than rampant?

[IronLionZion]

10. you don't want to know

imagine the worst you can. The real figures are even worse than that. The majority of it will never get caught.

[WileEcoyote]

28. Here's a military contracting firm

http://www.onesullivan.com/pages.php?cur=7

That didn't do jack shit for the V/A hospital back in 2005. The slowest paced major remodel I've ever witnessed. On several months on the job and all they did was shuffle papers and fire sub contractors who didn't bill them HIGH enough.

Yeah no kidding! The more the subs billed them the higher their take in the deal. All at tax payer expense of course...

[BlueEyedSon]

5. And the only reason they got busted is they're not Halliburton

[Terran]

6. I work with federal funds through HUD

and this makes me blow a gasket. HUD makes us account for every freakin' *penny* we get from them; they probably spend 100 times on financial accountability than what they are actually preventing in fraud. And then I hear this kind of sh*t, not to mention no-bid contracts with Halliburton. The Pentagon throws dump trucks full of cash at the military, while the real needs are met with Scrooge-like suspicion and mountains of documentation requirements and still don't get a 100th of the funding the military does.

:grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr::grr:

[MindPilot]

7. And I thought the $8 the guy on e-bay charged for shipping a CD was excessive. n/t

[Divine Discontent]

45. see! us ebay sellers aren't so bad after all!

lol.. I've heard of rate increases jacking up the prices for shipping from, say $10 to $18, but I think nearly a million MIGHT raise a bit of a red flag - and oddly, there's no person in auditing that found this within days of it happening??? well, maybe there was and it took this long to come to light.

[momster]

9. After Wrapping in Hand-Plucked Chickenhawk Feathers

place each washer in 24k gold box, being careful to handle only with the ruby-lined tweezer (one use only). Dip box in platinum wash until throughly coated, roll in diamonds and Belgian chocolate. After mistress licks off chocolate, open box (with the single use red diamond tweezers), remove washer, dipping in champagne (domestic, please, to comply with Patriot Act), to remove chickenhawk feathers. Stick washer in standard envelope and send to Iraq with USPS stamp. Repeat for each washer.

[badgervan]

12. You or I...

... would have to make restitution on that money. Anyone know if this company will have to repay that $?

[harris8]

15. Sounds like they have to repay most of it...

This article (http://www.wilmingtonstar.com/article/20070816/APN/708160860) says one of the two sisters, Charlene Corley, is facing a fine of $750K and must return $7 million in cash & property. Her sister, Darlene Wooten, apparently wrote a check of $4 million back to the DOD and then committed suicide.

As for them being repig donors, haven't found any political contribs by either on opensecrets.org...

[Divine Discontent]

46. oh good heavens!

how horrific... I guess the guilt was too much for the one who did herself in.. shameful they screwed the country, I guess she didn't want to go to prison.

[Stinky The Clown]

13. My company does work as subcontractor on fed contracts and we get audited if we .....

.... try to bill an extra 11 cents in photocopy costs.

For decades I read about these scams. For those same years I have been involved in government contracts (and non-government, too). And in those same years, I have NEVER seen how to chisel an extra dollar out of anyone.

[catrose]

14. I used to work for a govt contractor

We weren't allowed to go to lunch with vendors. We couldn't receive holiday gifts from them, not even tschotskes, and we were supposed to discourage their sending us Christmas cards. We couldn't put our personal stamped outgoing mail in the company mail boxes.

I have strong feelings about people who do stuff like this. Even stronger ones about Halliburton.

[MindPilot]

27. I found one little hole when I worked as a mechanic at a base gas station

There was no cross-check between the flag sheet (the form on which a tech records the time billed for a particular job) and the repair order. That is something everyone from the smallest shop to the mega-dealers do, but this place didn't. So I could for example bill the customer for 30 minutes, and pay myself for five hours.

[williesgirl]

16. Our tAX $'s at work! Did they repay? If not, chain gang should right. recommended

[HuffleClaw]

17. laundering money for BushCo. is my guess

part of the fabled 'missing' TRILLION dollars.

[peacetalksforall]

18. Classic laundering with the finest soaps and rinses.

[AtomicKitten]

19. War-profiteering is tantamount to treason.

[mod mom]

23. and that's how it should be treated-WAR PROFITTEERING. We need a War Profiteering Act that will

be of such severe penalty as to deter individuals/businesses from even considering attempting such acts.

[Booster]

26. More importantly, we need people at the Pentagon to have at

least a high school education - NOT ONE PERSON SAW THIS BEFORE PAYING OUT? I find that extremely hard to believe. Wasn't it the Pentagon that lost over a trillion dollars in the last couple of years? The Pentagon is the problem.

[Old and In the Way]

50. There are software auditing tools designed to catch these kind of errors.

Any large company has these tools to help catch gross input errors. My guess is that the contracting officer and the AP person were in on it.

[anitar1]

53. Spenbax, I think the problem has always been the Pentagon. n/t

[YDogg]

20. treasonous

[Tab]

21. Clearly I'm not thinking outside the box enough.

Here I've been, working for a living.

</sarcasm>

[whistle]

22. Now these sisters are selling pirated DVDs on Ebay for $0.01 Buy it Now and charging $29.99 s&h

...not as profitable but same scam

[marmar]

24. As Smedley Darlington Butler said:

"War is a racket." :argh:

[zonkers]

Smedley rocks.

[Old and In the Way]

25. Something stinks......obviously they have screw machines available

in Iraq to make this stuff, there'd be no need to get these shipped 1/2 way around the world.

[whopis01]

44. did you read the article?

The article talks about how the woman running this scam was fined $750,000 and faces 20 years in jail after pleading guilty. So there is no question that something stinks...

[Old and In the Way]

49. No, just the OP.

For this to work, you can bet there was someone on the inside that was in on it.

[whopis01]

64. I tend to think that as well....

however, it almost appeared from reading the story that if you are working for the government and give them a bill for anything that is to be delivered to a combat area, they will pay whatever you ask them... I'm not sure which scenario is worse, the person on the inside, or a complete lack of concern for what is paid for services...

[DesEtoiles]

29. Meanwhile, back at Walter Reed with the rats and all...

[demo dutch]

30. No surprise there!

[The Wizard]

31. Any connection to

the Carlyle Group and the Bush cartel? They are heavily invested in defense contractors.

[DU GrovelBot]

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[high density]

33. Well that's great to know

That the Pentagon just automatically approves things without an automatic sanity check in place to stop the most obvious fraud. Shipping is expensive, but when a shipping charge is 5.3 million times the amount of the item ordered you'd think somebody would notice this before it went on for six years. Is there no accounting/inventory system in the government that keeps track of how much money is being spent on spare parts and the average cost of them?

[bridgit]

34. for that money i hope they got a signed, return receipt...

:rant:

[zbdent]

35. I wonder how many Republicans made their millions

on selling $400 hammers ...

[Miss Chybil]

36. Traitors! nt

[derby378]

37. Filthy rich, but still traitors...!

[zbdent]

38. Reminds me of the time the Govt spent thousands of dollars paying some

company to ship a few boxes of documents ... across the street ...

[whopis01]

41. Where is Al Gore smashing an ash tray when you need him??? n/t

[mrgerbik]

43. what about the biggest waste of all

the interest paid on the debt....

[whirlygigspin]

47. Halliburton thanks you for your kind investment

[mrgerbik]

48. The Federal Reserve would like to thank you for your hard earned dollars

In Fiscal Year 2006, the U. S. Government spent $406 Billion of your money on INTEREST payments to the holders of the National Debt. Compare that to NASA at $15 Billion, Education at $61 Billion, and Department of Transportation at $56 Billion.

[lonestarnot]

51. To China who actually is funding the death.

[ashling]

52. These people stealing money from our troops

And aiding Al Quaeda, are they not?

[Duppers]

54. NBC tonight

(x-posted from another thread)

When introducing the story tonight, Brian Williams just took an unnecessary swipe at NASA by saying "in the vain in NASA's $10,000 toilet seat, the Pentagon......"

What shit, considering:
"The $10000 toilet seat was a nice anti-NASA myth created by budget hawks in the US Senate. The myth grew out of the allegedly astronomical cost of a single ..."
http://talkback.zdnet.com/5208-11048-0.html?forumID=1&t...


MSM has to protect the Pentagon contractors, i.e. themselves!

[Recursion]

55. I seriously doubt that's what it was for

What's that line from Independence Day?

"You don't actually think they were spending six hundred dollars on a hammer, two thousand on a toilet seat?"

That money went for something, but it wasn't for shipping gaskets.

[semillama]

58. Funny

usually Texas gets its 19-cent washers from Mexico

(wish I could take credit for that one!)

[DuaneBidoux]

60. Sometimes it does (not saying here) make sense to send a part at great expense.

It isn't exactly how much the part costs but what cost can be avoided by having the part. The actual tile that was chipped on the space shuttle probably was several thousand dollars at most--the space walk to investigate the tiles probably cost (in extra labor at Johnson Space Center in Houston)much more than that. It might have been possible that the tiles could not have been repaired with what was on the current space flight in which case either we or the Russians had to send another space flight with the material. Then the headlines could have accurately read: "Two one thousand dollar tiles are being sent via a 70,000,000 dollar mission."

I'm not saying this was justified--but this think of "$20,000 toilets" or whatever is completely out of any context and has been misused (mostly by conservatives) to find something to bash in the government. But context is EVERYTHING with these headlines, and context is usually what we never get.

[malmapus]

61. What sucks is that the soldiers pay for this in the end...

I hear some folks saying, why don't they cut defense spending!? Which in itself is a valid question when you see waste like this being done.

But the money that is spent on this, that should go to the budgets that units get for things like training, equipment and so on doesn't. Those units have to make it up.

I served in 3rd Special Forces Group in the 90s, and I remember my own unit having to "go cheap" on everything to make ends meet.

The really sad part was, when we would make due with what was given to us, the new budget would get cut to that. Because you got by with that so you don't need any more money.

It was really sad, you think being a part of Special Operations we would get it all, and yet I can't even count on my hands and feet the times that we had to cut back on training exercises, or sending soliders like me to schools (Air Assault, Path Finder, SERE, Ranger) because there was no budget for it. For schools we would get told that they could afford to send like 12 of us, then over the course of a week that number would get cut and cut till only two or even one would get sent. Most likely cause the money was being spent on those thousand dollar toliet that defense contractors were ripping the military apart on.

I can't even imagine how much these fuckers are getting away with in a "time of war".

[Supersedeas]

62. What's a little accounting amoungst Repubby cronies

[Chipper Chat]

63. Clarification - Patrick Air Force Base is a city by itself

and has its own zip code. It is just south of Cocoa Beach FL. Canaveral Air Force Station is just north of the city of Cape Canaveral - area was called Cape Kennedy until recently, but I've confused y'all enough. However, I'm sure there are lots of 19-cent washers laying around at each place.
http://upload.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=bigboard

[toad6147]

65. And then, there's this guy...

...on another forum, who posted this:
"Charlene Corley, a life long democrat and member of SC Plumbers union local 138! worked as a Clinton campaign aid in 1996 campaign."

What do you say to this?

[jmowreader]

66. I say "you guys REALLY need to get off your Clinton addiction!"

Come on. You KNEW someone was going to figure out a way to tie this to Bill Clinton.