Also see: The Boston Globe's Invisible Ink: Blackwater's Bribe
This item was also an Invisible Ink -- in other words, an item that never appeared in the printed Globe, just on its web site.
"Blackwater is focus of bribery investigation" by New York Times News Service | February 1, 2010
WASHINGTON - The Justice Department is investigating whether officials of Blackwater Worldwide tried to bribe Iraqi government officials in hopes of retaining the firm’s security work in Iraq after a deadly shooting incident in 2007, according to current and former government officials.
The officials said that the Justice Department’s fraud section opened the inquiry late last year to determine whether Blackwater employees violated a federal law banning American corporations from paying bribes to foreign officials.
The inquiry is the latest fallout from the shooting in Nisour Square in Baghdad, which left 17 Iraqis dead and stoked bitter resentment against the United States.
A federal judge in December dismissed criminal charges against five former Blackwater guards implicated in the episode, but Vice President Joe Biden said the Obama administration would appeal that decision.
That appeal to be worthless. Those guys won't be seeing the inside of a courtroom again.
See: Operation Iraq: Blessed Blackwater
The bribe investigation, confirmed by three current and former officials speaking on condition of anonymity, follows a report in the New York Times in November that top executives at Blackwater had authorized secret payments of about $1 million to Iraqi officials to buy their support after the shooting. The newspaper account said it could not determine whether any bribes were actually paid or identify Iraqi officials who might have received the money.
Yeah, that was an Invisible Ink, too.
WTF is going on?
Why is the Boston Globe protecting war-looters?
The Justice Department has obtained two documents from the State Department, which had security contracts with the company, that have raised questions about Blackwater’s efforts to influence Iraqi government officials after the Nisour Square shootings, according to two US officials familiar with the inquiry.
One document, a handwritten note, shows that a Blackwater representative told a senior official at the US Embassy in Baghdad that the company had hired a prominent Iraqi lawyer to help the firm pay compensation to Iraqi victims of the shootings, a practice encouraged by the State Department.
According to the document, as described by the two government officials, the Blackwater official said the firm had hired the lawyer hoping that the lawyer’s close ties to top Iraqi officials, including Prime Minister Nouri Kamal al-Maliki, would help Blackwater obtain a license to continue operating in Iraq....
It would appear that the strategy suceeded, no?
The second document is a response from a senior embassy official, an e-mail message warning Blackwater officials not to bribe the Iraqi government, the officials said....
Several former Blackwater employees.... had told The Times that Blackwater’s then-president Gary Jackson authorized about $1 million for payments to Iraqi officials, with only a small portion intended for victims.
A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment.--more--"
Update: Blackwater Reportedly Charged US Government For Strippers, Prostitutes
