Ex-FEMA inspector pleads guilty to taking kickbacks

[rainbow4321]

Yet chimp's cronies still get away w/ their no-bid contracts and inflated prices...both in Iraq and the hurricane damaged areas.

http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/local/miami/sfl-cfema28apr28,0,7493130.story?coll=sfla-news-miami

A former Federal Emergency Management Agency inspector pleaded guilty Thursday to taking kickbacks from Miami-Dade residents in exchange for signing off on inflated damage claims after Hurricane Frances in 2004.

Tywanishia Preston, 28, who worked for three weeks in the fall of 2004 as a FEMA contractor, was charged in October 2005 with soliciting bribes from four FEMA applicants by offering to get them more money from the agency.

Osborne said Preston padded the damage report of one applicant in exchange for $800. That individual paid Preston an additional $2,800 to $3,000 after receiving $18,316 from FEMA , Osborne said.

Federal prosecutors brought the charges after the South Florida Sun-Sentinel reported that FEMA handed out more than $31 million to residents of Miami-Dade County for Hurricane Frances, although the storm struck 100 miles to the north.

[Divernan]

1. Not a regular FEMA employee but a temp (3 weeks) w/ 8 hrs. training.

Another result of the way Bush slashed the agency - cutting back on the trained reservists and forcing hiring of unscreened and incompetent temps. Privatization by another name. Her lawyer says she pocketed $4,000. Compare that to the missing millions Haliburton cannot account for.