Judge’s actions overshadow already troubled Iraq war contracts case

Judge’s actions overshadow already troubled Iraq war contracts case
By Ray Hanania

Jurors in the controversial Halliburton corruption case playing out in a Federal Courtroom in Peoria complained to U.S. District Court Judge Joe Billy McDade last week they were “deadlocked” following their first full day of deliberations in the three-week long trial.

The drama began when the jury foreman sent McDade a note Thursday afternoon identifying one juror as refusing to support a unanimous verdict. Instead of simply responding by telling jurors to continue their deliberations, McDade summoned the foreman who sent the note to explain why it was sent.

Declaring his fears the hold-out juror might be "biased," "predisposed" and questioned if she was “fair,” the soft-spoken McDade then summoned all the jurors into to his courtroom to express “regrets” about the apparent deadlock.

“The court is unsure if this is a disagreement among jurors, or a breakdown in the jury process,” McDade told the jury of 3 men and 9 women as he reread his instructions that he had read twice before. “Each of you looked me in the eye and said you would be impartial. … The lone juror may feel she is being pressured but I assure you, that is not the case.”

Clearly concerned about defense protests that his actions might prejudice the jury, McDade was compelled to repeat, “This is not an attempt to pressure anyone to change their vote.”

Well, then, why tell them anything? Why not simply accept their decision or just ask them to try harder without any comment? Why force the jury to make a decision?

McDade and prosecutors are in a bind. This is the second time the case has come before McDade’s court. The first trial, held in Rock Island, deadlocked with the same prosecutors and same evidence.

At the heart of the case is Jeff Mazon, a southwest suburban Chicago man who is accused of inflating the cost of a war related contract while working for Halliburton/KBR in Kuwait in exchange for a bribe he allegedly received six months after he quit the company’s employ.

Prosecutors cited finger-pointing from his Halliburton supervisors and said Mazon manipulated an embedded dollar-to-Kuwait Dinar formula in an Excel Spreadsheet. The defense argued the spreadsheet error was a simple mistake. One Kuwait Dinar is equal to 3.3 U.S. Dollars but the mistake increased the dollar amount from $685,000 to $5.52 million.

Witnesses agreed Mazon was overworked and tired, like all of the employees at the company who worked up to 20 hour days, seven days a week as the country rushed into the Iraq War in March 2003.

The alleged “bribe” was a business deal, Mazon insisted, one he negotiated six months after he left Halliburton and took a new job in Greece for the Athens Olympics. Mazon did not try to conceal the payment and he openly declared it to U.S. Customs when returning from Greece to the states.

McDade could have simply ignored the jury foreman’s note and instructed the jurors to go back and continue deliberating. But by expressing concern about possible “juror bias,” McDade was reflecting a tenor in the case that has been decidedly anti-defense.

At the start of this second trial, McDade squared off with Mazon’s attorney J. Scott Arthur in a heated clash. McDade warned he would not give Scott “leeway” to explore an assortment of issues Scott felt Mazon needed to make his defense but that the judge said were outside the realm of the case.

The judge prohibited Mazon from arguing as a part of his defense:

· That he is being made a “scapegoat” by his supervisors at Halliburton who approved the contract and that other major contract errors have occurred. Mazon argues that the inflated contract was a mistake caused by a flawed embedded formula in an Excel Spreadsheet and not a part of a “scheme.”

· That Halliburton and his supervisors “framed” him in order to pass the responsibility from them to him. While Mazon acknowledges the contract price was a mistake, he says that the mistake was reviewed by everyone of his supervisors who were more concerned with processing government contracts as fast as possible, rather than with the accuracy of the contracts themselves.

· That the government participated in the conspiracy to heap the blame on Mazon, a small cog in a nearly one trillion dollar contract system that has pumped tens of billions of dollars of profit into Halliburton’s coffers. Halliburton’s former CEO is Vice President Dick Cheney.

· That Halliburton has a history of improper conduct. Halliburton is plagued by scandals, all unrelated to Mazon, yet the prosecutors were able to bring in two convicted felons who worked for Halliburton and who admitted taking bribes to sully Mazon through guilt by association. Mazon was not permitted to argue that Halliburton has much to lose in a trial that addresses the bigger issues.

Defense attorneys expressed concern Mazon cannot receive a fair trial under those restrictions. “The very act of calling the jurors back in to listen to the judge tell them he is concerned and then to re-read his instructions clearly pressures the one juror who supports acquittal,” Mazon’s attorneys said.

In their flash at the start of the trial, McDade offered a chilling warning to Arthur, cautioning, “Whether or not there will be a 3rd trial in this case by you is questionable.”

Under McDade’s orders, the jury deliberated about 8 hours Friday before retiring for the weekend and telling the judge they were exhausted. Jurors resume deliberations Monday.

The jury may in fact reach a unanimous agreement on a verdict and the hold-out juror may succumb to the pressure and change her mind. But the question that seems lost is “can this jury now be fair?”

(Ray Hanania is an award winning columnist and Chicago radio talk show host. He can be reached at www.ArabWritersGroup.com and by email at rayhanania@comcast.net.)

Jeff Mazon trial: A case of speculation and circumstance; but where is evidence?

Jeff Mazon Trial - a case of speculation and circumstance; Where is evidence?

The trial of Jeff Mazon, a former Halliburton employee accused of inflating a war-related contract in exchange for a kickback, enters its third week in a Federal courtroom in Peoria.

This case was tried once before in Rock Island before the same judge and by the same prosecutors, and with the exact same evidence. The jury in the last trial deadlocked, failing to reach a decision.

The deadlocked Rock Island jury obviously was not overwhelmingly conviced that Mazon was guilty of the crimes charged and was in fact an innocent man. U.S. Attorney Jeffrey B. Lang, insists it was not a majority but declined to disclose how many jurors did in fact support conviction versus acquittal.

Having reported on the first trial, the only thing new about this trial is déjà vu. The same witnesses. The same accusations. Nothing new, so why are we here again?

Mazon's defense is solid. He admits that a calculation error was committed on the contract in questions, but a mistake is not intentional criminal conduct. The prosecutors insist he inflated the price on purpose in order to receive a "bribe" that was paid to him six months after he left the company, even though the error was later discovered. In the end, the inflated payment amount was corrected.

The contract was among thousands of contracts issued to support the war effort in Iraq in early 2003. It was issued in Kuwait Dinars. Each Kuwaiti Dinar is equal to 3.3 U.S. Dollars. The spreadsheet used to calculate the conversion mistakenly increased the dollar amount instead of converting the Kuwait Dinars into U.S. Dollars.

Mazon and his attorneys have always alleged this case is little more than an effort by Halliburton and the Bush administration to make Mazon into a "scapegoat," taking attention away from the bigger issues of corruption involving the war itself and the role that Halliburton has played in managing the contracts.

Bush wants the American public to believe something is being done about allegations of war-related corruption that are rampant, but not enough so that the public might ask the logical question: "If there is so much corruption under Halliburton's watch, why is Halliburton and its subsidiaries continuing to receive the lucrative contract business?"

Halliburton was formerly owned by Dick Cheney, the U.S. Vice President. Many expect Cheney to return to Halliburton when his term ends this year.

The prosecutors failed to convince the jury the first time that Mazon committed any crime. And they haven't presented any new evidence in this second trial to suggest the outcome will be any different.

Last week, we heard testimony from a number of prosecution witnesses who failed to make a connection between the allegedly intentionally "inflated" contract bid of a Kuwaiti company and the million dollar loan that Mazon received over 5 months after he left his job with Halliburton.

The testimony of each and every government witness was speculative and inconclusive. They could not say with certainty that the contract in question was intentionally inflated. How could jurors reach that conclusion?

There are no eye-witnesses to a "deal." No evidence of a conspiracy between Mazon and the Kuwaiti contractor to inflate the contract in exchange for anything. All there is before the jury is the prosecution's assertions and an Excel Spreadsheet with a poorly constructed formula that each time miscalculates the final amount with an embedded inaccurate formula.

It is also a fact that Mazon did enter into a business relationship with a Kuwait businessman and his company.

But, before Mazon engaged in private business with the Kuwaiti, he left Halliburton and worked for the Athens Olympics in Greece for at least six months.

The prosecution's allegation that the loan Mazon received from the Kuwaiti contractor was a "kickback" in exchange for the inflated contract price is weak. The loan is not connected in time or logic to Mazon's employment with Halliburton. There is no testimony other than suspicion.

Additionally, the loan was in the form of a draft check that was declared to U.S. customs when Mazon entered the U.S. Attempts to deposit it in an "off-shore account" was at the direction of the bank in Greece where he was working at the time, six months after leaving Halliburton's employ. The "loan" eventually never materialized, the check was never cashed and no money exchanged hands.

As I prepare myself to sit through yet another week of trial, I cannot help but think about how these wasted dollars could have been better spent by the Bush administration. One failed attempt to convict should have been the end of this apparently never-ending story.

- Ray Hanania