We all know that the rules for military personnel, government civilians, and contractors vary – with contractors having perhaps the most leeway regarding personal conduct. But it appears that things may have gotten just a little bit out of hand at one of our security contractors in Afghanistan.
Full-blown batshit crazy of out of hand, to be precise.
One of the US security contractors in Afghanistan – Jorge Scientific – is alleged to have really paid attention to employee morale. As in drunken parties, open drug use, sophomoric stupidity, and other absolutely unprofessional and asinine behavior. There are also insinuations of either lack of supervision (or turning a blind eye) and/or similar bad behavior on the part of some in uniform having the responsibility to supervise this contractor’s work or while visiting the contractor’s facilities.
It got so bad that two former employees quit in disgust, went home from Afghanistan early – and filed a lawsuit. And it turns out they took a little cellphone video supporting their claims before they left.
Oh, and did I mention that one of those captured on that video has admitted repeatedly using illicit drugs, corroborating at least part of the two former employees’ story?
The contract under which this “wonderful” behavior occurred appears to have been W911QX-1O-C-0096, let on 4 October 2010. The value of the contract appears to be a bit over $47M. Unfortunately, if the contract is structured in the typical base-plus-option-years form they’ve likely just started an option year – and are thus probably on-board for the next 12 months, like it or not.
ABC News now has the video, and reputedly was planning to air the story on “World News Tonight” and “Nightline” yesterday. I didn’t watch either program, so I don’t know if they did or not.
Looks like somebody’s got some ‘splainin’ to do.
New excuse for Green-on-blue attacks inbound in 3…2…
Wow, does that mean that as a soldier in BAF, I can expect to be the victim of an organized protest similar to the Koran Burning incident earlier this year? Will I catch a rocket because these guys are being douchenozzles?
It should be common knowledge to those that care that we have more civilians than we do soldiers in Afghanistan. Doing the same jobs, mostly prior service folks, at double and triple the pay. Without UCMJ to keep them straight.
It’s all Hillary’s fault…
I never know about this stuff. Those who are former military are Veterans, like most of us. I can’t begrudge their getting paid much more than what they used to receive for the same or similar work while in service. As for the drunkeness and drugging, I don’t know whether two or three or, for that matter, 20, are representative of the contractors or whether the video stars were on duty. The drug angle is alien to me but getting thoroughly plastered is not. There is no organization that is without its alcohol and drug abusers. The security contractors are not immune and so long as they bounce these guys and, perhaps, offer some help to them, I can’t otherwise get all crazy as Nightline or World News Tonight would have us get.
@4 Dopers and drunks are a regular problem in civilian employment regardless of occupation although some occupations are more prone than others. Someone can lay off certain drugs and alcohol to avoid failing a urine test and make the first entry point. Many small companies still don’t require one for employment. Health insurance covers addiction recovery when someone gets caught, and some of them who get caught have jobs like train engineer, bus driver, airline pilot, where people are endangered by the actions of the addict. I saw the piece on the news last night and figured it was another attempt to show how crazy everyone is who serves, and how when they are privately employed their craziness marches on unimpeded….
Are we certain these guys aren’t former Secret Service types? 🙂
In my current position I see recurring reports like this. The case of the Xi contrators who signed (as Eric Cartman) for a bunch of AK-47s and shot up a market is one that stands out to me; the contractors were former military, but the bad apples were former shitbag soldiers.
Had anyone in the hiring process looked at their DD-214s (and cared) they would likely have known that. Had they been properly supervised, they wouldn’t have gone that far.
Like the accident investigators looking at the chain of events leading up to a fatal accident, had one stopgap been activated, none of that would have happened.
Having alcohol in a non alcohol zone is enough to pull their clearances. No clearance, no ability to work. They get shipped home. That’s one solution. But contracting officers are notoriously bad about supervision. Sometimes the company does it, but if you have pissants in management, its all politics and who you know and blow that gets you either off or not punished. I have been to TDYs where there was alcohol outside of duty hours but no excessive drinking nothing that gets the company in trouble. Other companies are like frat houses. Depends on command presence. There should have been enough maturity in those contractors not to do this. Like virtual insanity said, this probably wasn’t the first time they pulled this stunt. Company HR failed big time.
I wonder if AirCav would be be bothered by this:
Naked Pool Parties, Alleged Sex Acts at Kabul U.S. Embassy Force Out 10 Guards.
What the FRACK is going on over there!?
Eric Holder’s DoJ was notified, looked into the case, decided it had no interest. Never told the Army. The Army found out when the news media called them. I have no idea why Holder’s boys were not interested or decided to not inform the Army, it doesn’t appear that Jorge Scientific is run by Obama donors. (Yes, they was my first explanation, but Open Secrets suggests otherwise.)
For some reason, I’m reminded of a past recipient of Ranger Up’s “Douche-of-the-week” award, Mike the Contractor.
http://www.rangerup.com/doofwememico.html
@9. “I wonder if AirCav would be be bothered by this:”
Well, why don’t you ask him? He just might answer you.
Casey, you did notice that the story you cited was from more than 3 years ago (Sep 2009) and that the contractor involved was working for DoS vice DoD – didn’t you?
One of the dark and dirty secrets of war is that there are some people who seek out these chaotic places not in spite of, but because the rules of civilization don’t apply there. The military has a system (the UCMJ) to try and keep a lid on this phenomenon, but I know from personal experience that even that doesn’t work as well as the military likes to think it does (and General Order No. 1, the military’s own version of the Volstead Act, has worked just about as well as prohibition in every combat zone I’ve been to.)
Contractors, freed from the punitive power of the UCMJ, are self regulating and we can see how well that’s worked. I’d guess a lot of contractors in both AFH and IRQ can tell pretty similar stories.
Bullshit! One of the benefits of being a contractor is that you can QUIT! You’ll be sent home usually within 72 hours. I’d seriously question the SF claims as well because all of the ones I’ve met have been consummate professionals unlike this clown.
“An American security contractor in Afghanistan, who was caught on video so stoned that he couldn’t speak, told ABC News that the “nightmare” environment in which he felt trapped drove him to drugs.
Kevin Carlson, a 41-year-old former Special Forces soldier, worked as a team medic in Kabul for Jorge Scientific, a major U.S. defense contractor tasked with protecting Americans in the war-torn city and the subject of a recent ABC News investigation.”
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/us-contractor-abused-drugs-cope-afghanistan/story?id=17533534
Jabatam: I think that’s what happened to the two guys who filed the complaint and took the film (which they later gave to ABC) – they got fed up, quit, and got sent home early.
I’m not buying the other guy’s “the situation drove me to drugs” BS, either. But at least he came clean about using when confronted and corroborated that part of the film.