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The War Profiteers - War Crimes,
Kidnappings & Torture |
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July 23rd,
2007 - Major Jailed in Bribes Case |
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By Gary Contreras San Antonio Express-News July 23, 2007 Federal authorities on
Monday arrested an Army major stationed at Fort Sam Houston on charges that
he took almost $10 million in bribes and expected $5.4 million more on
military contracts he had rigged. A handful of agencies,
including investigative arms of the Justice and Defense departments, arrested
Maj. John Cockerham, 41, and his wife, Melissa, 40, in the pre-dawn hours
Monday as the couple returned to Fort Sam Houston from Louisiana. They appeared later in
federal court in San Antonio, where a judge ordered them held without bail
pending a bond hearing scheduled for Wednesday. Melissa Cockerham is accused
of helping her husband receive and hide some of the bribe payoffs. The two
are charged with accepting bribes, defrauding the United States, money
laundering and conspiracy. Their arrests are but a
piece of an ongoing probe in which the Defense and Justice departments are
trying to identify the companies Cockerham allegedly accepted kickbacks from.
They also have identified offshore bank accounts that are suspected to have
some of the illegal proceeds, court records show. Investigators with the
Army's Criminal Investigations Division and the Defense Department's Criminal
Investigative Service, as well as the FBI, U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement and other agencies, are looking at every contract Cockerham
handled - from bottled water to laundry services for American troops in
Kuwait and Iraq. The secrets largely
unraveled in December, after agents seized a hand-written ledger at the
couple's home on Fort Sam Houston. John Cockerham is a contracting and
procurement officer and was assigned to a division within U.S. Army South,
which has its headquarters at Fort Sam Houston. Criminal complaint
affidavits unsealed Monday detail allegations that Cockerham was involved in
far more graft than the $7 million reported in a document that was made
public in federal court in Detroit last week. Brian Sierra, a spokesman
for the Justice Department, confirmed the arrests but declined to comment
beyond the affidavits. The payoffs included
hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash stuffed in briefcases and bags that
were accepted by Melissa Cockerham and others for John Cockerham, the
affidavits said. Much of the graft occurred in 2005 and was deposited in
banks in the Middle East and much of it appears to have been moved to
offshore banks in the Caribbean, according to the affidavits. "In total, the ledger
records that J. Cockerham received $9.6 million in bribe payments from at
least eight contractors and anticipated receiving $5.4 million more,"
said the affidavits, filed in San Antonio on Monday. The affidavits said the
ledger listed six associates of John Cockerham, including his wife, who
received money on his behalf. Some of the money Melissa Cockerham received
was deposited in a safe deposit box for a business in Kuwait she and another
woman operated called Worldwide Trading, which is suspected of being used to
launder the bribes. The Dec. 12 search also
netted numerous pages comparing the benefits of various offshore banking
havens; account application documents from the First Caribbean International
Bank in the name of John Cockerham; a letter from First Caribbean dated June
14, 2005, memorializing a visit by one of his alleged associates; and
information establishing offshore bank accounts in Melissa Cockerham's name,
including at a bank in Grand Cayman. Also found were 15 pages of
Internet research into the advantage of offshore accounts in Barbados; four
pages on the anti-money laundering statutes enacted by the Cayman Islands;
and information about several companies' commercial products aimed at
safeguarding offshore assets, including "Bulletproof Asset
Protection." Agents also seized a
handwritten note reflecting John Cockerham's interest in two books:
"Crime and Secrecy: The Use of Offshore Banks and Companies," and
"Offshore Haven Banks, Trusts and Companies: The Business of Crime in
the Euromarket." A second handwritten page that was seized contained
notes on how to purchase property through a friend in order to protect the
identity of the true owner, the affidavits said. The Cockerhams confessed
partially to their roles after agents confronted them with the ledger, and
then admitted further involvement after more questioning, the affidavit said.
Also found during the Dec. 12 search were receipts from banks in Jordan and
Detroit that showed hundreds of thousands of dollars in deposits that agents
have linked to John Cockerham or his alleged associates. Among the seized
documentation was information about a bank account that agents found
contained nearly $175,000 in Detroit, which the government is trying to keep
through a civil forfeiture action in federal court there. The account was
allegedly opened by a man identified as Megde "Mike" Ayesh Ismail,
who is also charged in the complaint, and is a suspected payoff for an
$800,000 bottled-water contract that John Cockerham is accused to have
steered to Green Valley, a contractor in Kuwait that employed Ismail, court
records show. Yet even while the probe was
ongoing, the Cockerhams appeared to go about their daily lives. John
Cockerham, for instance, showed up at June's rally for presidential candidate
Barack Obama at Sunset Station. "Hello Congressman Sir.
It would truly be an honor to have you as the new Commander and Chief for the
Armed Forces. Thanks for taking the time to stop by San Antonio and address
the local Texans (sic) concerns," Cockerham wrote on the DailyKos
politics blog. And as investigators chase
offshore accounts for the money, the Cockerhams made a puzzling request for
high-dollar defendants. They asked for court-appointed lawyers. U.S.
Magistrate Judge Pamela Mathy granted the request, at least through
Wednesday's bail hearing. External link: http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA072407.01A.general_charged.34e1363.html |