WT: Federal prison inmates used makeshift hatchets and a screw shoved through a piece of wood among other rudimentary tools to manufacture thousands of faulty Kevlar combat helmets designed to protect the lives of U.S. soldiers on the battlefield, according to a highly critical watchdog report that offered new details about the government boondoggle.
More than 126,000 helmets manufactured at a Texas prison under a government contract were recalled after inspectors found major defects, including serious ballistic failures, in 2010, according to a report issued Wednesday by the Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General. Even though the government and taxpayers lost $19 million on the defective helmets, ArmorSource, the company responsible for the helmets, was awarded more government contracts even as the Justice IG probe was being conducted.
The helmets were being produced just as the George W. Bush administration was escalating the U.S. military mission in Iraq, the famous “surge” to turn back al Qaeda militants.
ArmorSource was awarded a $30 million contract to manufacture both lightweight and heavy-duty combat helmets for the Department of Defense in 2006 and subcontracted the work to Federal Prison Industries (FPI), a Bureau of Prisons program that uses inmate labor to manufacture a wide array of products for the federal government. A lack of oversight of the Beaumont, Texas, program, which has since been shut down, led to a host of problems, according to the inspector general’s investigative summary. Prison inmates produced defective combat helmets for U.S. soldiers
Well then,
Follow the lot numbers,
Prosecute those bastards
You can’t make this stuff up!!!
You can’t trust felons to produce our military protective gear.
Somebody should be shot for treason for making this happen.
Did they get $15.00 an hour and an absentee ballot?
It’s not clear from this article whether the defective helmets were deliberately produced, or simply the result of the prisoners not being furnished the proper tools to do the job correctly. If the latter, the prisoners should not be held accountable, and the company should be severely punished instead.
Any soldier who suffered a head injury should sue them. How many brave men may have died from this? Sickening greedy immoral bastards in corporate America .
Read ” Gulag Archipelago”.
The damage the forced labor
“Zeks” did to the Soviet
economy as described therein
is a direct parallel. Lesson
learned? Of course not.
Unfortunately these contracts are so full of legal crap and CYA that there’s likely no way to hold the company or the prisoners accountable. Just look through the fine print of your auto or home insurance policy sometime, it’s the same stuff. Car damaged during an act of war? Tough shit! Kevlar helmets used in battle are defective? It’s war, tough shit!
“Federal Prison Industries, also known as UNICOR and FPI, is a wholly owned United States government corporation created in 1934…”
So this is government work. Thanks, Frankie D.
Say, didn’t Barky just tell us last week that he is moving out of the privatized prison industry?
This is just another “blow it out your ass” investigation. Why prisoners are allowed to do anything other than make license plates, till fields, and break rocks is beyond me. Helmets for our soldiers? fogetaboutit!
Anyone suggesting that prisoners make Rolls Royce engine parts?
“makeshift hatchets and a screw shoved through a piece of wood”
Um, prison geniuses, I hate to break it to you, those are not tools, they are weapons. Is that what those rascals told you?
and how many are converts to pislomb ?
Typical wasteful government procurement. Could have gotten the same quality and a lower price from prison industries in North Korea.
Well now we know whose side convicts are on. Virginia governor McCauliff should be charged with treason for giving his state’s prisoners the right to vote.
I’m sure Hillary will be much more conscientious making helmets. Of course, they’ll start her out making license plates, like the rest of the inmates.
“under a government contract”
Nuff said.
Figures it would have been set up under the New World Order Bush administration. Every one of the Bushes should be arrested and deported to Iraq.
Prisons are a hotbed of radical islamists, so sabotage is the natural outcome. Follow the money; which friend of Obama profited from the contract.
Breaking News: multi-million dollar government contract was just awarded to Juliet Prison for the Criminally Insane for brain surgery.