Guantanamo Interrogation Work Was Improperly Awarded Twice

[Rose Siding]

A newly disclosed Lockheed Martin Corp. contract to provide interrogators to the military at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is being rewritten after twice being found improperly awarded.

Interior Department spokesman Frank Quimby said yesterday that the department will redo the contract on a sole source basis because interrogators are already on the job and the contract will expire in January. The General Services Administration determined that the contract had been improperly awarded twice before.

The department will not renew the contract once it expires, Quimby said. "This is not really what Interior's mission is really about," he said. "We're going to get out of the interrogation business."

Bethesda-based Lockheed declined to comment on the details of the contract, which was disclosed yesterday in the Wall Street Journal.

The issue mirrors the controversy surrounding a CACI International Inc. contract to provide interrogators to the military in Iraq, which was spotlighted after an Army investigation identified one of CACI's employees as a suspect in abuse of Iraqi prisoners. The GSA launched an investigation after determining that the work, managed by the Interior Department, was improperly ordered under an information technology contract.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A53666-2004Jul15.html

[mike_c]

1. this stinks to high heaven....

The GSA launched an investigation after determining that the work, managed by the Interior Department, was improperly ordered under an information technology contract.

Sounds like an attempt to cover their tracks.

[muriel_volestrangler]

2. Maybe they're claiming their information technology

was thumbscrews. Just old-style technology to gather information, that's all.