Nothing gets my blood boiling faster than reading about a business who puts our soldiers in harms way for profit. The individuals responsible for putting the men and women who serve our country at risk, need to have their US citizenship revoked and given the same considerations as those given to enemy combatants! ~Forseti
Cheap Steel Puts U.S. Soldiers’ Lives at Risk, Two Steel Distributors Say
TRACEY DALZELL WALSH – BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (CN) – January 21, 22011 - Lives of U.S. military personnel have been put at risk because distributors misrepresented the quality of their steel and “passed off inferior, untested steel as steel meeting certain industry specifications and thereby induced plaintiffs to unknowingly buy the inferior, untested steel at inflated prices,” two steel dealers says in a federal RICO complaint.
O’Neal Steel and Leeco Steel sued Worldwide Steel Unlimited, General Purpose Steel, Lance Chatkin and Bruce Adelstein in the 66-page complaint, alleging RICO violations, fraudulent misrepresentation, wantonness, breach of contract, and negligence.
O’Neal and Leeco say they sold some of the steel for use in military Humvees and armored vehicles that were deployed to Afghanistan, Iraq and Israel. They say the defective steel products have put the lives of U.S. military personnel at risk.
The steel distributors call the defendants’ operations “a criminal enterprise, as defined by RICO, controlled by two persons who, through two corporations and various employees, fraudulently represented the quality of goods sold to enrich themselves and the companies they controlled through unlawful means, including mail and wire fraud, in disregard of possible personal injury, death, property damage or cost and expense.”
The complaint continues: “By virtue of this criminal enterprise, Defendants passed off inferior, untested steel as steel meeting certain industry specifications and thereby induced Plaintiffs to unknowingly buy the inferior, untested steel at inflated prices. Plaintiffs, relying on Defendants’ representations and certifications that the steel was tested and met the specifications in Plaintiffs’ purchase orders, then unknowingly sold this inferior, untested steel to Plaintiffs’ customers as steel meeting the customers’ specifications for applications for which it was potentially dangerously unsuited. In fact, none of the steel sold by Defendants to Plaintiffs had been tested either by the manufacturer or independent laboratories as represented and certified by Defendants, and much of the steel did not in fact meet the specifications in Plaintiffs’ purchase orders as represented and warranted by Defendants. If the steel did meet the specifications, it was completely fortuitous and not by virtue of test results as represented by Defendants.
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Michael O’Connell – (Federal News Radio) – December 27, 2011 – The drawdown from Iraq is in its final stages. We know how the troops are getting home, but how is all the stuff getting back to the U.S?
