information sage

musings about the Indian-American experience in the Information Age

30 September 2005
Pentagon Revokes Whistle Blower's Clearance for Stealing Pens

Show of hands... Who has never stolen a pen? Anybody?

WASHINGTON - An officer who has claimed that a classified military unit identified four Sept. 11 hijackers before the 2001 attacks is facing Pentagon accusations of breaking numerous rules, charges his lawyer suggests are aimed at undermining his credibility.

The alleged infractions by Army Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, 42, include obtaining a service medal under false pretenses, improperly flashing military identification while drunk and stealing pens, according to military paperwork shown by his attorney to The Associated Press.

Shaffer was one of the first to publicly link Sept. 11 leader Mohamed Atta to the unit code-named Able Danger. Shaffer was one of five witnesses the Pentagon ordered not to appear Sept. 21 before the Senate Judiciary Committee to discuss the unit's findings.

The military revoked Shaffer's top security clearance this month, a day before he was supposed to testify to a congressional committee.

Mark Zaid, Shaffer's attorney, said the Pentagon started looking into Shaffer's security clearance about the time in 2003 he met in Afghanistan with staff members of the bipartisan commission that studied the Sept. 11 attacks and told them about Able Danger.

Zaid said he can't prove the Pentagon went after Shaffer because he's a whistleblower, but "all the timing associated with the clearance issue has been suspiciously coincidental."

Source: Pentagon Revokes 9/11 Officer's Clearance - Yahoo! News


menu

home

archives


September 2005

October 2005

November 2005

February 2006

March 2006

May 2006

August 2006

September 2006

October 2006

January 2007

May 2007

June 2007

categories

India
Bollywood
SciTech

of interest

rss feed
Blogger.com