The slime reports just keep on coming.
"Get off your fucking ass, put my wife in a car, and go get her a watch," Crum is alleged to have told Camille Geha, the sales manager at Khalifa Hilton resort in Kuwait, in early 2004. Aware that the company was spending up to $1.5 million a month at the hotel, Geha is said to have told an unnamed embassy staffer that he had a jewelry store at the Marina Mall opened in the middle of the night to get a new watch.
We won't even speculate about the urgency of that request by the appropriately named Crum. The crass arrogance we've come to expect, marking Americans of all kinds for generations to come.
Wendy Hall is becoming the best little corporate PR whore in the world. And she's getting lots of practice. So, the lovely Mrs. Crum realized her watch had gone missing in the middle of the night? And she knew beyond a doubt it was stolen? And right then and there justice had to be administered.
[...]
The internal embassy communications also portray Richard Jones, the U.S. ambassador to Kuwait, as anxiously pushing the Texas-based company to buy overpriced fuel from a specific company, Altanmia Commercial Marketing Company. Altanmia officials counter that KBR staff were deliberately undermining their bids.
The collection of documents, including e-mails, memos and reports were released to the media by California Representative Henry Waxman, to top ranking Democrat on the House Committee on Government Reform. They are only a small part of over 400 internal documents delivered to the committee, which wields oversight of U.S. contracts relating to Iraq.
[...]
Related allegations made by Altanmia officers in the newly released embassy documents also include:
â"KBR officers solicited bribes openly and "that anyone visiting their seaside villas at the Kuwaiti Hilton who offers to provide services will be asked for a bribe."
â"A senior level Iraqi employee of KBR was fired in August 2003 for complaining to company managers about corruption.
"KBR managers conspired to sabotage Altanmia's ability to fulfill a contract so that the agreement could be reassigned to another company willing to pay a bribe.
"KBR trucks were being used to "backhaul" stolen crude oil out of Iraq for personal gain.
"The wife of a KBR senior executive received a watch valued at well over $20,000 (8,000 Kuwaiti dinars) in appreciation from a real estate company that was receiving rent at twice the market value from KBR for office space. (This allegation overlaps with the story of Tom Crumâ's wife but is significantly different, although it may be one incident reported incorrectly by a second source).
[...]
KBR also apparently discharged employees earlier this year working at Camp Anaconda in Iraq believed to be involved in wrongdoing. In postings on the Web blog called "A Minute Longer - A Soldier's Tale" one former procurement manager, Laszlo Tibold, is accused of awarding a gravel contract at five times the price of a competing offer. Another posting claimed that KBR's contracting department at Camp Anaconda was getting kickbacks.
A March 12 posting then announces:
"Mr. Tibold has since been fired for his contract writings there at Camp Anaconda, along with some of his buddies. However their contracts still remain and we continue to pay against them"
There's more in that story - kickbacks and lawsuits. Textbook reading about corporate crime.
Graphic from the very talented TJ at POAC
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