Pentagon overpaid billionaire oil tycoon by $200 million in rigged procurement scandal
Mar 20, 2011 at 6:59 PM
DailyBail in FRAUD, corruption, defense, government spending, government waste, harry sargeant ii, oil, pentagon

Sargeant is pictured in the middle.

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Source - UK Daily Mail

A Pentagon audit has revealed that the federal government overpaid a billionaire oilman up to $200 million.

The audit found that Harry Sargeant III was overpaid on several military contracts worth nearly $2.7 billion.

It also found that three contracts the Florida businessman won were awarded under conditions that effectively eliminated the other bidders.

The audit, by the Defense Department’s inspector general, was posted on the Pentagon’s web site this week.

It estimated that the department paid the oilman '$160 [million] to $204 million more for fuel than could be supported by price or cost analysis'. 

Sargeant, a once prominent Republican donor, first faced scrutiny over his defence work in October 2008, when he was accused in a congressional probe of using his close relationship with Jordan’s royal family to secure exclusive rights over supply routes to U.S. bases in western Iraq.

According to the Washington Post, Republican Henry A. Waxman who led the probe, asserted in a letter to Defense Secretary Robert Gates that Sargeant had won the three jet fuel contracts, despite having the highest bids, because he had an effective monopoly over the routes.

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