Audit Shows DHS Credit Card Fraud, Abuse

[Kadie]

Audit Shows DHS Credit Card Fraud, Abuse

By LARA JAKES JORDAN, Associated Press Writer
33 minutes ago


WASHINGTON - Wielding government-issued credit cards, Homeland Security employees racked up hundreds of thousands of dollars in unjustified expenses last year, including booties for rescue dogs, iPods, designer rain jackets and beer-making equipment, according to a congressional audit released Wednesday.

Investigators also cited more than 100 missing laptop computers that department employees bought in Hurricane Katrina's aftermath, although officials say at least some have been found.

Poor training, lax oversight and rampant confusion over what employees are allowed to buy with government-issued credit cards "allowed potentially fraudulent, improper, abusive, or questionable transactions to go undetected," Government Accountability Office investigator Gregory D. Kutz told a hearing by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

He estimated that 45 percent of department purchases with the cards — reviewed from June to November 2005 — were deemed improper.

The report "shows yet again that the Department of Homeland Security seems to be sometime run more like a college fraternity house, than an agency meant to protect us from terror," said Sen. Charles Schumer (news, bio, voting record), D-N.Y.

more...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060719/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/homeland_security_waste_4

[Crankie Avalon]

1. A few years back in one of the civilian DoD agencies, a guy...

...used his govt credit card to pay for nights out at a "gentleman's club," and he even used it to pay for breast implants for one of the women dancing there.