Another KBR employee raped in Iraq.
Today, Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) held a hearing on the alleged rapes by U.S. contractors in Iraq and the lack of federal prosecutions. Dawn Leamon, who worked for KBR in Iraq and has two sons who served as soldiers, is the latest victim of sexual assault to come forward. She testified that she was “unaware of any measures to date being taken against the KBR employee or the member of the U.S. military who attacked me.” Yesterday, the Justice Department reversed course and agreed to answer Senate questions on why it has not prosecuted any of these cases.
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Aaah, yes - exporting democracy and freedom the W way.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:14 pm(With an assist to Five Deferment Dick’s old company.)
Why DID Halliburton give Cheney such a big severance package?
How will they ever make that money back?
Oh, yeah - no bid contracts.
Uh oh…I sense another sternly worded letter is about to be born. This is your new america. KBR is more valuable than our very own citizens. Are we angry yet?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:15 pmtowelieskull,
There’s been a lot of “alleged” rapes… too many to assume they are all frauds. After the Duke case we all need to cool our jets about jumping to conclusions but I think it’s well past the point of reasonable doubt with this particular story.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:20 pmStrat92117 - Why bother with a letter? Don’t you know that contractors cannot commit crimes in a war zone? L. Paul Bremer made sure of that before he installed our puppet government over in Iraq.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:21 pmI don’t hear any of this story on the MSM.
Why?
Isn’t sex & war sexy enough for them?
It’s time for America to hold these offshore, tax evading, no bid, 3rd world labor force, contractors to task. The only word they fear is…
accountability
April 9th, 2008 at 3:21 pmCheney: So.
Don’t want to rock the boat, it would cut into corporate profits if this comes to light.
towelieskull you are complete and total scum, but then you know that already.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:27 pmGotta wonder if KRB/Halliburton plans to sell their used women on Ebay?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:29 pmDidn’t you know that KBR stands for Killing, Burglary and Rape?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:35 pmReminds me of Mel Brooks’ Blazing Saddles. These KBR guys like rape.
Obviously they don’t believe in karma. What you want to bet they call themselves Christians though?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:35 pmIi one of the links Rep. Conyers is ’embarrassed that the Department of Justice can’t even come forward” . . . well, embarrassed is such a nice way to put. HOw’s ’bout I’m way past outraged that Congress, now controlled ostensibly by Democrats, has done absolutely nothing to reign in the US government’s reliance on firms such as KBR or to make these entities and those they employ subject to some law, be it US, Iraqi (ah, wouldn’t that be interesting) or some international body. But then citizen outrage hasn’t gotten us very far for the past 7 years; why should it start now. Keep holding those hearings and believing they constitute oversight. They don’t; Congress ain’t; and we all deserve better.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:36 pmThis particular victim is pointing at a U.S. soldier as well as a fellow KBR employee. I know that when one KBR employee is raped by another KBR employee, the matter goes to arbitration (which is totally insane, but apparently that’s acceptable to our government). What happens when the victim is KBR and the perpetrator is subject to the UCMJ? Does “arbitration” trump the UCMJ or is it the other way around?
And yes, it’s an outrage no matter who is doing the raping — rapists must be held accountable for their actions.
Just curious — if one KBR employee goes so far as to murder another KBR employee, does that also have to be resolved through arbitration? How serious does a crime have to be before any outside set of laws are applied?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:38 pmrobbez_92107 Says:
April 9th, 2008 at 3:21 pm
Strat92117 - Why bother with a letter? Don’t you know that contractors cannot commit crimes in a war zone? L. Paul Bremer made sure of that before he installed our puppet government over in Iraq.
Yeah, I know. I thought for a second I lived in a country where people who do bad things are punished and people who do good things are rewarded. Silly me…I forgot, I live in Bush’s amerikkka.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:39 pmMethinks the Justice Department is afraid of Halliburton, KBR, Blackwater and the other criminals: George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condi Rice, Alberto Gonzalez just to name a few.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:39 pmIt looks like they only act when forced to defend their inaction, otherwise it’s hands off.
towelieskull Says:
April 9th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
alleged
___________________________________________
Yes, how convenient. We must say “alleged” until a perpetrator is found guilty. And since nobody is ever going to be found guilty, I guess we’ll have to say “alleged” for a long, long time.
Your emphasis of the term doesn’t mitigate the seriousness of the problem.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:42 pmTo towelieskull — yup, just “alleged.” But, here’s the rub, simpleton, since KBR ain’t covered by any laws, these cases will always be “alleged.” The only recourse anyone has in these cases is secret arbitration, if they are lucky. Since KBR will be making a fair number of arbitrators a fair amount of money, who do you think will win? Alleged . . . it’s alleged the US is a Christian nation . . . WWJD . . . probably rape a teammate in Iraq while getting paid to occupy a country and waste a nations treasure, resources and lives keeping corporate profits up and oil flowing. Alleged . . . I’ll alleged your a caring human being. I bet I’m wrong.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:42 pmtowelieskull Says:
April 9th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
alleged
_____
Yes, alleged. Just like all the alleged terrorists imprisoned in Guantanamo Bay. Shall I assume you feel the same concern for protecting their judicial rights as you do for KBR’s?
April 9th, 2008 at 3:47 pmMaybe the Rape Squads from the Kosovo War,or Uganda could be reactivated, to show the KBR men how it feels to be raped! I sure wish that some of rapists names would be released (by accident) so we could go find and talk to their mothers, wives, girlfriends, children, or in some cases their boyfriends! That would make a wonderful ambush video, you know the type that Billo is famous for!
April 9th, 2008 at 3:49 pmI hope that under our new president, some simple standards of behavior will be required of all government contractors, with actions of employees subject to some acceptable system of law. For contractors working within the United States, it’s understood that the workers are subject to their local laws, but something needs to be spelled out for contractors working in unstable war zones — such as a code modeled after the UCMJ.
What’s going on currently is ridiculous and needs to stop.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:50 pmceltic cynic Says:
Methinks the Justice Department is afraid…..
Nope. It’s completely subservient to those criminals. Hence, the firing of U.S. attorneys and the imprisioning of Seligman. The DoJ is an active co-conspirator to the war criminals in the administration.
April 9th, 2008 at 3:50 pmI said it yesterday, all we’ll be hearing is “I don’t recall,” “I don’t know,” and “I’ll have to get back to you.”
Each day I wake up less sure what kind of country I live in. Our military and Iraq contractors have a systemic acceptance of raping comrades and colleagues. We also have a State Dept. and DOJ that have pursued a systemic policy of cover up, denial and obstruction in regard to these serious crimes. Who’s going to step up and put an end to this?
-AF
Andrew Sullivan Is A Fraud
April 9th, 2008 at 4:13 pmOf course, everybody knows, it’s “far-left loons” and “Islamofacsists” who do all the bad stuff./stoopid off
April 9th, 2008 at 4:15 pmHopefully the reich-wingers blame the victim and defend the company again.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:18 pmkbr — raping female employees; raping the u.s. taxpayer. rape. it’s their business — and they excel at it.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:28 pmK illing
April 9th, 2008 at 4:29 pmB ilking
R aping
What is seriously disturbing is the Reichwing’s callous attitude towards rape. Case in point…
The local baseball team is carried by the local Reichradio station. During the games they run an ad, for their afternoon drive time show, in which the host responds to a plan for installing more efficient street lights with the quip: “What? You want to make it easier to rape someone?”
Personally I find an entity which uses a rape joke as advertising to be reprehensible. Add in the blind support of Republicriminals and one sees how deep the rot has set in. Reichwingers apparently don’t consider crimes against persons as criminal. Victims deserve what they get because they’re “weak”. Only crimes against (their) property generate any outrage.
April 9th, 2008 at 4:42 pmKBR and Blackwater are now metaphors for corrupt crony-ism.
Another MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.
April 9th, 2008 at 5:02 pmHeh. And Saddam’s “Rape Rooms” were one of the reasons why we took him out.
Perhaps it’s time we took out KBR, eh?
April 9th, 2008 at 5:11 pmK lan of
April 9th, 2008 at 5:37 pmB loody
R apists
Zimzone Says: I don’t hear any of this story on the MSM.
Why?
I wouldn’t know. I gave up on the corporate media a long time ago. I did, however, see her on Democracy Now this morning along with Jamie Leigh Jones, the first person to go public with her story of being gang raped by her fellow contractors at KBR, and Karen Houppert, a writer for The Nation where the story first appeared.
In some ways it’s hard to blame the MSM for this. The media is all about “eyeballs”. If most of us wanted to see these stories they’d give them to us but for some reason we’d rather have “bread and circuses”. Something is very wrong, perhaps terminally wrong, with a society which devalues stories such as these while blondes disappearing on tropical islands and celebrities going to rehab get 24/7 coverage by nearly every outlet.
April 9th, 2008 at 6:45 pmWhen people agree to participate in a war, they agree to allow themselves to look at other humans as no longer being human. This transfers to humans on our “side”. It all goes with the territory of being in a war. Once you start killing people, the rest comes easy.
April 9th, 2008 at 7:28 pmWhat is this!? Open season on women…?
April 9th, 2008 at 9:26 pmBussiness as usual in mercenary world…
April 10th, 2008 at 5:55 am