Matthew M. Burke at the Stars
and Stripes offers a piece on another Navy officer taken down with the “Fat
Leonard’ bribery and fraud scandal.
Another Navy officer has
fallen under the specter of the ever-growing “Fat Leonard” fraud and corruption
scandal.
Former Cmdr. Troy Amundson (seen in the above Navy photo on the right),
50, of Ramsey, Minn., pleaded guilty Tuesday in District Court in San Diego to
one federal charge of conspiracy to commit bribery for trading “confidential,
proprietary U.S. Navy information” for entertainment expenses and prostitutes,
according to a statement from the U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of
California.
Amundson is the 20th of 29
defendants to plead guilty in the scandal and faces up to five years in prison
and a $250,000 fine.
The charges stem from a
decade-long conspiracy where foreign defense contractor Leonard Glenn “Fat
Leonard” Francis of the Singapore-based Glenn Defense Marine Asia traded bribes
and gifts — from cash to Spanish suckling pigs and luxury travel — to a slew of
top Navy officers across the Pacific in exchange for information on ship
movements and contracts, resulting in tens of millions of dollars in fraudulent
over-billing.
Francis (seen in the above photo) pleaded guilty in
2015 to bribery and fraud charges.
“Amundson deliberately,
methodically, and repeatedly traded his public office for entertainment
expenses and the services of prostitutes, and in so doing, aligned himself with
a foreign defense contractor over his Navy, his colleagues and his country,” U.S.
Attorney Adam Braverman said in the statement. “We are pressing forward in this
investigation until we are certain that all involved have been held
accountable.”
Amundson was in a unique
position to aid Francis and GDMA as the officer in charge of the Navy’s joint
military exercises in the region from May 2005 to May 2013, the statement said.
He was responsible for maintaining relationships with foreign navies.
As part of his plea, Amundson
admitted that from September 2012 through October 2013 Francis paid for meals,
drinks, transportation, other entertainment expenses and prostitutes for
Amundson and other Navy officers.
You can read the rest of the
piece via the below link:
You can also read my
Counterterrorism magazine piece on the Fat Leonard case via the below link:
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