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Lt. Col. Gutierrez
Lt. Col. Gutierrez
id=14857
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Take Action now raising questions for such major American food companies Iraqi explorers plan to
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one of the biggest fraud probes of the Iraq War.
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Then the tables turned. The Kuwaiti contractor accused Col.
PETITION: Gutierrez of seeking bribes, setting in motion a bizarre chain of
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Stand Up events that left his military career and his 22-year marriage in More »
Against ruins. On Sept. 4, 2006, he was found dead in his quarters at
the age of 41. Next to his body were an empty container of
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prescription sleeping pills and a plastic bottle of antifreeze.
War in Food Companies Face
Afghanistan The story of Col. Gutierrez, who Army investigators allege U.S. Probe Over Iraq
wound up tainted by the very corruption he complained about, Deals
is one thread in the expansive fraud and corruption
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US Labor Against the War : Inside the Greed Zone http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?id=14857
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US Labor Against the War : Inside the Greed Zone http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?id=14857
Features Camp Arifjan sends numerous truck convoys to Iraq every day.
Most of the freight is handled by Public Warehousing, which
began as a modest Kuwaiti government spinoff. Now publicly
E-Mail This Page traded, it is one of the largest transport companies in the world.
Printer Safe Under a series of contracts worth more than $6 billion, Public
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Warehousing is designated a "Prime Vendor" for virtually all
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food served to U.S. forces in Iraq and Kuwait -- some 150,000
stomachs.
Col. Gutierrez and his team were getting help from Public
Warehousing's chief competitor, Tamimi Global. In January
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US Labor Against the War : Inside the Greed Zone http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?id=14857
But soon Col. Gutierrez was making decisions that weren't good
for either Public Warehousing or Sultan Center. In early May,
for example, he requested that some $21 million in purchases of
vegetables, dairy and baked goods be shifted from Public
Warehousing to Tamimi.
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US Labor Against the War : Inside the Greed Zone http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?id=14857
On Aug. 13, Col. Gutierrez and Mr. Rahman met once again,
this time at the officer's home. They allegedly discussed a
$3,500 payoff in exchange for inside information on bulk fuel
and laundry services contracts, the Army case record states. But
again no money changed hands. The officer claimed to need
cash because he had taken a young Kuwaiti woman as a
girlfriend, according to an investigator's affidavit. [screen] U.S.
Army A few days before Col. Gutierrez was arrested, his former
housekeeper called his American wife and alleged he had
secretly converted to Islam and married an 18-year-old Kuwaiti
woman. Investigators found several text messages he allegedly
sent to the housekeeper denying her claims and urging her to
retract them.
At the time, Col. Gutierrez's American wife, who had been living
with him in Kuwait, had returned to the U.S. to attend to a sick
relative. Days later, she received the news that he had
purportedly married the Kuwaiti girlfriend in a phone call from
her husband's former housekeeper in Kuwait, who was angry
about being fired.
The two men left in Col. Gutierrez's car for Mr. Rahman's
home, the case record says. As they drove, Mr. Rahman offered
the officer a bundle containing the 1,000 dinars, according to
two people with knowledge of the investigation. Col. Gutierrez
told him to put it in the car's center console, they say. Agents
then surrounded the car and arrested Col. Gutierrez.
The colonel protested that he was being set up. His widow and a
lawyer hired by his family now say they suspect he was framed
by Public Warehousing because the company knew he had
blown the whistle on it. A spokesman for Public Warehousing
say the company had merely "notified the government of a
suspected corruption ring within the U.S. military in Kuwait"
and "played a pivotal role in a successful sting operation that
stemmed from the investigation."
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US Labor Against the War : Inside the Greed Zone http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?id=14857
FIVE DAYS AFTER his arrest, his military lawyer, Capt. Stephen
McGaha, motioned to release him from preventive detention.
"The government has chosen to materially misrepresent the
strength of their case by charging one alleged instance of bribery
5 separate ways," he complained. About a week later, Col.
Gutierrez was released from detention and transferred to nearby
Camp Victory to await court-martial proceedings.
Many questions about the case remain. How did he meet his
second wife and why did they decide to marry? What was the
nature of the Col. Gutierrez's relationship with the Tamimi
executive later convicted of bribery?
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US Labor Against the War : Inside the Greed Zone http://www.uslaboragainstwar.org/article.php?id=14857
Mrs. Gutierrez says she doesn't know what to think about her
late husband's purported second marriage. But she refuses to
believe that he was corrupt. "None of this stuff fits in his
character at all," she says. "He had never been involved in
anything like this, and he has been in several other positions
like this where he had access to lots of money, millions and
billions."
"I'm very upset that he was put in that situation in the first
place," she continues, referring to his assignment to a base
allegedly riddled with corruption. "Either way, whether he did
commit suicide or not, the military has blood on their hands, in
my opinion."
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