[BBC] US jails Fat Leonard in Navy's biggest bribery scandal
A Malaysian businessman has been sentenced to 15 years in jail for his role in the US Navy's biggest corruption scandal and for skipping a previous sentencing hearing.
Leonard Glenn Francis, known as "Fat Leonard", pleaded guilty in 2015 to bribing senior Navy officials with millions of dollars in cash, prostitutes, luxury travel and top-shelf liquor and cigars.
In exchange, Francis said he received classified information and was able to overcharge the Navy $35m (£27m) for his company's services to the 7th Fleet based in the Indo-Pacific.
He had been due for sentencing in 2022 but he escaped in September that year by cutting off his ankle bracelet, and was recaptured within days.
The US Attorney's Office said Tuesday's sentence reflected admissions in his 2015 guilty plea, his "extensive cooperation with the government", and his guilty plea earlier on Tuesday for failing to attend the original sentencing hearing.
The court also fined the 60-year-old $150,000 and ordered him to pay the US Navy $20m in restitution.
His company, Singapore-based Glenn Defense Marine Asia, was also sentenced on Tuesday to five years probation and was fined $36m.
US officials said the scandal had weakened public trust in some Navy leaders and its fallout will be long-felt.
Francis was arrested in California in 2013 and he pleaded guilty to bribery and fraud charges in 2015.
After his escape in September, he was recaptured days later in Venezuela while trying to get to Russia.
His case came to be known as the Fat Leonard scandal because of Francis' rotund frame at that time.
Francis was returned to California last December under a prisoner swap between the US and Venezuela that saw Washington release an ally of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro in exchange for 10 American detainees.
"Leonard Francis lined his pockets with taxpayer dollars while undermining the integrity of US Naval forces," said US Attorney Tara McGrath in a statement.
"The impact of his deceit and manipulation will be long felt, but justice has been served today," McGrath said.
The bribery and corruption that Francis had "fostered" within the US Navy over many years was "aggravated and egregious", but under custody, he helped investigators uncover "unprecedented levels of corruption" in the establishment, the US Attorney's Office said.
Francis provided investigators with detailed information on hundreds of sailors, from petty officers to admirals.
“Mr. Francis’ sentencing brings closure to an expansive fraud scheme that he perpetrated against the US Navy with assistance from various Navy officials," said Kelly Mayo, Director of the defence department's Office of the Inspector General.
"Mr. Francis’ actions not only degraded the 7th Fleet’s readiness but shook the Fleet’s trust in its leadership who furthered his corrupt practices,” Kelly said.
[Jpost] Ancient Roman dam saves Spanish town from devastating floods. At least 214 people died and over 200 remain missing in Spain's worst flooding in living memory.
[ZeroHedge] At an all-hands meeting last week, Mark Zuckerberg reportedly told Meta workers that plans to build an AI data center powered by nuclear energy were scrapped after rare bees were discovered on the proposed site.
Meta's proposed AI data center project with an existing nuclear power plant operator fell apart over environmental and regulatory challenges, according to a Financial Times report, citing two people familiar with the meeting.
The people gave no details about which nuclear power plant Meta planned to build an AI data center in an adjacent lot. They noted that Meta continues to search for locations to tap into carbon-free energy.
Here's more from the report...
Zuckerberg told staffers at the all-hands that, had the deal gone ahead, Meta would have been the first Big Tech group to wield nuclear-powered AI, and would have had the largest nuclear plant available to power data centres, two people said.
One person familiar with the matter said that Zuckerberg has been frustrated with the lack of nuclear options in the US, while China has been embracing nuclear power. China appears to be building nuclear reactors at a fast clip, whereas only a handful of reactors have been brought online over the past two decades in the US.
Incredible power demand growth from AI data centers has sparked a nuclear power revival in the US (but no fast enough when compared with China):
Amazon To Invest More Than $500 Million In Small Modular Nuclear Reactors To Power AWS
Nuclear Names Surge After Three Mile Island Planned Restart To Power Microsoft Data Centers
Nuclear Is Back: US Closes On $1.5 Billion Loan To Resurrect Holtec's Palisades Nuclear Plant
Sam Altman-Backed Nuclear Startup Oklo Signs Agreement With Dept. Of Energy For Next Phase Of Siting In Idaho
While we may not always see eye to eye with Zuckerberg, we share his concerns about China outpacing the US in nuclear power development. It's alarming that Western lawmakers, wearing climate crisis blinders, have pushed de-growth global warming and climate policies that only stifle industrial output and fuel inflation, while providing China a clear runway to eclipse the West's economy due to its total disregard for such policies.
It's safe to say that when the Communist Party in China builds coal power plants, concerns about bees are likely the last thing on their minds.
#1
I was researching the rare bees, I'm an Indiana beekeeper, and I found a story about a five mile wide 800 mile long transmission corridor. People should pay attention to this story.
See the link: https://kaninfo.com/news/feds-plan-massive-electric-corridor-through-kansas-and-nobody-knows-about-it-june-24-comment-deadline/
#4
Going back to the story... it's gotta suck to be a government toady and have your pet project derailed by that same government paying off some of their flakier debt-holders.
#1
Recently picked up our rental at Kalamazoo; a Nissan Rogue. They didn’t have any Toyotas or other good cars, just that or a plugin hybrid Jeep ( another dismal rental experience). Mrs. Ret. did the driving and absolutely hated the car; shifter awkward, console change tray immediately below start button ( handy tip: don’t reach for anything in that tray while underway, as your knuckles will hit thatswitch and immediately cause severe quiet in the engine room. Even Scotty would not be able to bring it back online….hated that f-ing car.
[DW] The German government is bracing itself for an extremely difficult transatlantic relationship. A scenario for which it is not really prepared.
Could Trump’s election have been the final straw that caused the fall of the current German government?
A nightmare has taken hold of the German government: Donald Trump ...So far he's been unkillable, and they've tried.... . It had clung to the hope that Kamala Harris once a marijuana-busting Caliphornia DA would follow in the footsteps of Joe The Big Guy Biden ...46th president of the U.S. We hold these truths to be self-evident. All men and women created ... by the — you know — you know, the thing... and continue the tradition of transatlanticism and multilateralism. That is, until Trump won the election surprisingly early and decisively.
Now the German government is ill-prepared, says Henning Hoff from the German Council on Foreign Relations: "It was a mistake to rely so completely on the Democrats ...every time you hear the phrase white people, white supremacy,white anything but paint, you're listening to a Democrat. Ask him/her/it to reimagine something for you; they do that a lot, though not well. They can hear a dog whistle a mile or two away. They invented the spoils system and Tammany Hall, and inspired the addition of the word (Thomas) Nasty to the English language. They want to stop continental drift and repeal the law of unintended side effects... ," Hoff told DW. "The special relationship that the chancellor cultivated with President Biden was perhaps a little too lopsided. The fact that there haven't been any contacts at all in the Trump camp will now come back to haunt him."
Memories of Trump's first presidency, from 2017 to 2021, are still very clear in Berlin. At the time, Trump cast doubt on NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... and threatened to withdraw US troops from Germany. He criticized Germany and other NATO countries for benefiting from US military protection without contributing enough to their own defense.
Henning Hoff believes that it is now important for the German government to "make up for its failures." "A much stronger signal is needed to show that the Europeans, especially the Germans, are truly prepared to shoulder a greater burden of their defense. If we continue to fumble along and argue — we have the dedicated funds (for the Bundeswehr), so the defense budget need only increase minimally — then we won't be able to impress anyone in Washington, not now and certainly not under Trump."
Deutsche Welle was liveblogging events all day yesterday.
[DW] German Chancellor Scholz says a vote of confidence is planned for January, possibly paving the way for snap elections. The move comes as Scholz fired Finance Minister Christian Lindner amid divisions over economic plans.
WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW
Germany's Free Democrats (FDP) withdrew all ministers from the Scholz government, formally ending three-party "traffic light" coalition
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, of the center-right Social Democratic Party (SPD), announces confidence vote in mid-January
The vote could bring forward a snap election in March
The announcement came after Scholz dismissed Finance Minister Christian Lindner, coalition partner from the neoliberal FDP
[Motley Fool] The large conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway (BRK.A) (BRK.B 5.36%), run by investing legend Warren Buffett, reported its third-quarter earnings results over the weekend. The report is a big deal for shareholders and all market watchers who are curious to see what moves Buffett and his team of investing experts made during the quarter because they indicate their overall view of the market.
Another reason investors watch Buffett is because he runs a $300 billion-plus equities portfolio that invests in some of the most popular stocks in the market. While the 13F report detailing Berkshire's exact stock holdings at the end of the third quarter won't be available until around Nov. 14, Berkshire's earnings report offered some clues about Buffett and Berkshire's investing decisions in the third quarter.
Based on these clues, we can determine that Berkshire sold hundreds of millions of shares of his two favorite stocks -- Apple (AAPL -0.33%) and Bank of America (BAC 8.43%) -- and piled into an ultra-safe asset yielding close to 5%.
Berkshire sold 334 million shares of Apple and Bank of America
How do people know that Berkshire sold all of these shares if we don't have its 13F filing? Berkshire's earnings reports detail the fair value of the company's five largest holdings in its stock portfolio, given their material impact on the equities portfolio and the company. You then can find the historical stock price on the last day of the quarter and calculate the share amount.
Here is where things stood at the end of the second quarter on June 30. (I'm using stock prices from June 28 because June 30 was a Sunday.) The numbers are in thousands:
[Task & Purpose via MSN] Capt. Lester Brown, Jr. was relieved of his duties as Navy Leadership and Ethics Command San Diego’s commanding officer. He had assumed command in September 2022.
Officials did not immediately say why Brown was relieved other than for a "loss of confidence in his ability to command," phrasing used in nearly all public announcements of a military leader’s firing. Zipper Issues™?
NLEC San Diego provides training and education for officers who are not yet commanders and courses for the enlisted leader development program.
Originally from Maryland, Brown graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy and spent his career as a Surface Warfare officer. His fleet assignments include command of the USS McFaul, an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer. During his career he served as the communications officer and main propulsion division officer on the USS Anchorage; main propulsion assistant and ordnance officer on the USS Sides; chief engineer on the USS Patriot and USS Philippine Sea.
He was executive officer of McFaul before taking command.
His awards include five Meritorious Service Medals, four Navy Commendation Medals, two Navy Achievement Medals, Global War on Terrorism Expeditionary Medal, and six Battle Efficiency Ribbons.
Capt. Richard Zeber, from NLEC Newport has been temporarily assigned to the San Diego position.
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/07/2024 05:05 ||
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Link ||
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#1
Sort of inconvenient that stuff like this makes the internet. It will limit his civilian job choices and he will have to become a Dem politician.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/07/2024 13:00 Comments ||
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[The Hill] Former Attorney General Bill Barr encouraged prosecutors to drop pending charges against President-elect Trump, saying the public "have rendered their verdict."
"The American people have rendered their verdict on President Trump, and decisively chosen him to lead the country for the next four years," Barr said in an interview with Fox News, after the White House race was called for Trump.
"They did that with full knowledge of the claims against him by prosecutors around the country and I think Attorney General Garland and the state prosecutors should respect the people’s decision and dismiss the cases against President Trump now," he added.
Trump was convicted in New York on 34 felony charges related to hush money payments to adult film star Stormy Daniels and still faces indictments in three other trials. His actions to block the peaceful transfer of power after his 2020 loss sparked federal charges as well as a case in Georgia, while the former president also faced federal counts for retaining classified documents at his Florida estate, before the case was indefinitely postponed by the judge.
Trump is set to face sentencing in the New York case later this month but has also sought to toss the case after the Supreme Court ruled that former presidents retain broad immunity after leaving office.
The Department of Justice (DOJ) under a second Trump administration is widely expected to move to drop both federal cases against the president-elect.
The GOP presidential nominee also pledged to fire special counsel Jack Smith, who is overseeing the election interference cases, "within two seconds."
#1
While I agree, the Prosecutors & Judges involved were political and not legal code based.
To avoid a legal system precedent, the cases should be independently reviewed and clearly shown to be politically based, and not legal code based.
Above all, it must be an open, fair and honest review to avoid it looking like a Banana Republic Political Revenge move.
Then EVERY person involved and/or failed to adhere to their Oath Of Office should be indited, banned from Government, and/or have their Licenses to practice law revoked.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
11/07/2024 12:57 Comments ||
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#6
Where has Barr been for the past several years, cuddling with his bag pipes?
Posted by: Regular joe ||
11/07/2024 13:54 Comments ||
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#7
Trump attorney Mike Davis:
"Let me just say this to Big Tish James, the New York Attorney General; I dare you, I dare you to try to continue your lawfare against President Trump in his second term because, listen here, sweetheart, we're not messing around this time, and we will put your fat ass in prison for conspiracy against rights. I promise you that, so think long and hard before you want to violate President Trump's constitutional rights or any other American's constitutional rights. It's not going to happen again."
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
...every time you hear the phrase 
[Task & Purpose via MSN] Capt. 
[The Hill] Former Attorney General Bill Barr encouraged prosecutors to drop pending charges against President-elect Trump, saying the public "have rendered their verdict."
