Halliburton subcontractor settles Iraq fraud allegations for $4 million News
Halliburton subcontractor settles Iraq fraud allegations for $4 million

[JURIST] Eagle Global Logistics (EGL), a Houston based company hired by Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown & Root (KBR) [corporate websites] to ship military cargo to Iraq, has paid the government $4 million [press release] to settle potential claims under the False Claims Act [text] that it inflated invoices for Iraq military cargo shipments, the US Justice Department said Wednesday. EGL was accused of charging a "war risk surcharge" on military shipments from Dubai, United Arab Emirates to Iraq between November 2003 and July 2004. The allegations arose when David Vavra and Jerry Hyatt sued EGL on behalf of the US under the whistleblower provisions of the False Claims Act. Both parties will receive $800,000 from the settlement agreement as a result of their lawsuit.

Christopher Joseph Cahill, former EGL regional vice president for the Middle East and India, pleaded guilty in the US District Court for the Central District of Illinois to inflating the invoices by over $1 million in a bid to cover the surcharges earlier this year. Cahill admitted to ordering a subordinate to change invoices to cover up for the fraudulent surcharges after he became aware of the government investigation. AP has more.

THIS DAY @ LAW

Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, murdered by Henry II's knights

On December 29, 1170, Archbishop Thomas Becket, former Chancellor of England, was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral by knights acting in the name of Henry II.

Becket and Henry had been entangled in a power struggle over, among other things, criminal jurisdiction over clergy. Read a contemporary account of the murder of Thomas Becket.

Texas attains US statehood

On December 29, 1845, Texas became the twenty-eighth state to join the United States of America when US President James K. Polk signed the Ordinance of Annexation. Texas had a complicated path to statehood because it had formerly been part of Mexico and then an independent republic. The US Congress passed the Annexation of the Republic of Texas Joint Resolution on March 1, 1845. Voters in Texas then approved the Ordinance of Annexation in October, before it was approved by the US Congress and signed into law by President Polk on this day in 1845. The US Supreme Court later ruled in Texas v. White that, despite its unique path to statehood, Texas did not have the right to secede from the union.