Well, well, well....here we go again.....
A New Jersey Engineer involved in specifying Tremco roofing - heavily - is getting "probed" by the FBI Criminal Investigations' Division out of Newark - in an insurance probe. It's not the first time in New Jersey that the roofing scams and insurance scams have been uncovered in the same probe...we just don't know yet if the FBI in Newark is on to the engineer being known for heavily specifying Tremco as well.....
Little wonder, given what I have seen in the San Francisco Bay Area, where, according to the former Hickman Roofing Regional Manager, "EVERY" Architect in the San Francisco Bay Area "was involved."
How exactly remains to be determined, but involved de facto or outright - they are. Even the international firms.....
Let me explain a little, to give you some background, and then read what is happening in New Jersey. It will make sense to you then....
Trying to find work in San Francisco after reporting a manager at UCSF had said they were getting kickbacks for (illegally) sole-sourcing roofing products in bid specs is like prying open the jaws of death.
San Francisco is a small town worse than anything I ever saw in Georgia, never did see it really....and it's like this statewide in California...so many people are involved......
In fact, "Everybody!" was involved according to a former Contracts Manager at UCSF and a former San Francisco School Board President...both laughing in my face as they said it -one who lied to FBI Agents in my case, the other laughing that she had said it to a Grand Jury looking into the millions of dollars stolen by her former head of Facilities at the San Francisco Unified School District.
The State of California and it's budget aren't laughing now.
Neither are the credit ratings bureaus......
Too many people are stealing.....for power, money, and more votes for the same...a truly vicious cycle here in California.
Eventually, here in this teeny tiny town of San Francisco, I did find a job at one point - saving an architect from his staff's admittedly uncoordinated drawings and bid specs - on a 29-unit, 8 story affordable housing project half a block from the Federal Building in San Francisco (421 Turk Street).
So they hired me and I did save them and the building owner, Asian, Inc., the estimated $800,000 in change orders anticipated by the contractor on an $8 million job, and we did get the tax credits under a horrific schedule - one of only two out of 12 to make it that year. The architect only had $56,000 in Errors and Omissions - on the roof!
All other change orders were due to staff at the San Francisco Mayor's Office of Disability - about $396,000 - because said Mayor's Office staff could not read plans (notorious for it) and approved them, then changed everything in the field.....
What was so interesting about this firm that needed my help - and a bit frightening later on when discovered - was that the woman who hired me (a "marketing" person, not an architect or engineer) not only knew that I had been in the San Francisco Weekly about what I caught onto, but my story.
It turned out that she was caught stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from the (mostly) absent architect....and right before that, I learned who she was.
And learned who she was after she had insistently determined to get me on a boat to the Farallon Islands, which I refused to go on.....the Farallons are about 50 miles straight out from the Golden Gate Bridge.......
You see, this woman had done something that alerted me to who she was - she had refused to tell me who her husband worked for - until about a year later, about the time she was caught stealing, she accidentally forwarded an email from him....and I recognized the firm.
As it turned out, her husband was in charge of the Mechanical Engineering Firm that was caught by John Karamanos in similar scams to the one I caught onto at UCSF and in his case, also at UC Davis. (University of California campuses).
John Karamanos owned a sheet metal firm, doing mechanical ductwork, including air control valves. The Mechanical Engineering Firm run by the husband of the woman that hired me was up to their neck in the "bundling of mechanical equipment" contracts - all going to the same source - in UC jobs. It included charges at ten times normal for Air Control Valves, leaking 30% instead of no leakage at ten times less the price - and placed in San Francisco Bay Area Hospitals.....
John Karamanos had caught gratuities involved to the Facilities personnel at UC Davis and UCSF. To read the story, click on the link at the top of the column to the right - with the picture of the San Francisco Weekly cover, "The Fix Is In."
Similarly, now in New Jersey, an Engineering Firm is involved with heavily specifying Tremco, and is somehow involved with sole sourcing and a large insurance scam targeting taxpayer dollars.....and in New Jersey, it seems that the FBI might be catching them.
In the roofing scam, the payoffs work like this: The Reps pay off City Council members, School Board Members, Business Managers, Facilities Managers and Maintenance Personnel....who then force architects to spec certain products. In some cases, not all by a long shot!, the architects and engineers get paid off - we hear in $10,000 payments here in the San Francisco Bay Area - to specify certain manufacturers.
But the roofing scam primarily works in targeting the budgetary decision makers, not the specifiers. FYI....
In other product scams related to engineering, it appears that the Engineering Firms getting a lot of the work are being paid off to do so.
And in other cases, separate from the scams, design professionals have had to make payoffs to public officials to get the work, as just reported in the Los Angeles Times last week, here:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-community-college-cruz-20110703,0,3808085.story
A Long Beach Architect was found to have served time in Texas for paying off officials for work...but was allowed to help "...manage major construction programs at community colleges in Southern California". In his case, apparently he paid off officials to get work, not paid off to illegally sole-source. Interesting.....
But what that architect did is different from the scams and their payoff systems, and so must not be "mixed up" into one kettle of fish...if the investigative agencies are to clearly define and stop what is going on.
So the engineering connection with the scams by one well-used engineer in Toms River, New Jersey public work is what the FBI Criminal Investigations' Division may have just caught onto in New Jersey.
We have again in New Jersey the Insurance Scams tied into the products scams - targeting the taxpayer dollar.
In a Sept. 6, 2007 FBI roofing scam and insurance scam sting, the FBI caught 2 Mayors, 5 City Council Members and 4 School Board Members across the state (NJ) - all Democrats - taking payoffs, by starting with one lone school board member, who pointed to someone else to go pay off and that person did the same - all over the state.
Are you all getting the picture, here, folks? Dirty politicians and bureaucrats all over, who know of each other, getting paid off......and all in one party in New Jersey.
Now there is one engineering firm in New Jersey suspected of some kind of similar issues - allegedly.
Wow!
This is getting extremely interesting, folks....could these scams using one engineer or architect in various areas to facilitate them - everywhere across the US and Canada, possibly England now?
See the report from New Jersey, at:
http://www.app.com/article/20110714/NJNEWS/307140073/IRS-FBI-show-up-home-Toms-River-Regional-s-former-engineer?
And see reports from the Sept. 6, 2007 arrests in the Roofing & Insurance Scam , where Eleven Public Officials are caught taking bribes for roofing contracts in Public Works Contracts:
http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/story?section=nj&id=5640158
http://www.nysun.com/national/legislators-mayors-arrested-in-new-jersey-bribery/62077/
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/09/06/clinton-supporter-arrested-in-nj-corruption-sting/
Update:
For those in other Countries looking at this blog, specifically Canada and England, and any others: Please contact us to report kickbacks in your country.
The FBI and Justice Department in this country can go after the manufacturers involved, from here, with laws we have. It is very important that you do so.
