Investigative Reports

A Carman/Welder in Beech Grove, Indiana, was terminated from employment on May 19, 2020, following an administrative hearing for violating company policy. Our investigation found that the employee failed to disclose his criminal convictions occurring prior to his employment on his initial application and during his employment, and he also failed to disclose multiple drug and/or alcohol related arrests once employed. Additionally, the employee inappropriately used or remained on sick leave and leave granted under the Family Medical Leave Act while serving time in jail.

One Amtrak electrician in Beech Grove, Indiana, resigned from his position on May 4, 2020, and a second was terminated from employment on May 11, 2020, following his administrative hearing. Our investigation found that both employees entered a supply area without authorization and stole company materials. Both employees admitted to the unauthorized entry and to stealing gloves and batteries.

We investigated allegations that U.S. Fish and Wildlife (FWS) volunteers at Ding Darling National Wildlife Refuge allowed guests to utilize Government housing, against FWS policy. We also investigated the circumstances surrounding the termination of two other volunteers from the refuge.We determined that two volunteers permitted guests to reside in Government housing on the refuge for several days, in violation of FWS policy and without authorization from refuge officials. We also found that refuge officials had a sufficient basis to terminate the two other volunteers from the refuge.

The OIG investigated an allegation that an information technology services contractor intentionally diverted a payment made by the Interior Business Center (IBC) away from the contractor’s assignee—an entity to which the contractor owed money—into its own bank account. As a result, the IBC paid the contractor instead of the assignee, and the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) lost more than $300,000.We found that the contractor changed its default bank account information in the system of award management to its own bank account, which caused the payment diversion, but we could not show the contractor changed the account information with the intent of diverting the payment. Furthermore, we found the IBC paid the wrong entity because it did not properly enter the assignee as the payment recipient in its contract management system.We presented this matter to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, which declined prosecution. The contractor filed for bankruptcy protection and could not return the money to the DOI or the assignee. As a result, the DOI paid an additional $324,544 to the assignee to fulfill the money owed under the contract.

A Communications and Signals employee violated Amtrak policy by repeatedly disabling the Dash Cam system—designed to monitor and record incidents of unsafe driving—in his company-assigned vehicle, including on December 1, 2019, when he was involved in an accident while operating this vehicle. During the OIG investigation, the employee denied that he tampered with, disconnected, or reconnected his vehicle’s Dash Cam system. The evidence, however, demonstrated that he manually disconnected the Dash Cam system at the times in question. The employee retired on May 6, 2020, prior to his administrative hearing.

This investigation was initiated after concerns were reported to the Office of the Inspector General that the duties of a managed-task contract employee working at TVA placed him in a position to direct TVA contracts to his company. While it was determined that, as a contractor, criminal conflict of interest statutes did not apply to this contract employee, the OIG made several recommendations to address this situation. The OIG recommended TVA do the following: (1) review the duties and responsibilities of the contract employee and ensure compliance with the Organizational Conflict of Interest terms of the contract; (2) require contractors acting in contract manager roles and/or involved with contracting decisions be required to disclose any actual or potential conflict of interest, similar to OGE Form 450, “Confidential Financial Disclosure Report;” and (3) ensure contract employees do not review or have access to information that could provide the contractor with an unfair competitive advantage.

The OIG investigated allegations that a U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) administrative assistant made numerous personal purchases using a Government purchase card from 2016 to 2018.Our investigation found that during that 2-year period the employee made 27 personal purchases totaling $7,454.88 using the employee’s Government-issued purchase card. We also determined that the employee lied during our investigation when the employee claimed some charges were for office supplies. We later established those purchases were for personal food and alcohol.The employee pleaded guilty to felony theft under a deferred judgment and was sentenced to 2 years supervised release. The employee also agreed to pay $7,454.88 in restitution and resigned from the FWS.

The OIG investigated allegations that an oil and gas production company failed to properly account for oil produced from Federal leases in the Bakersfield, CA area, resulting in a loss of mineral royalties owed to the Federal Government. The company was required to account for and report its oil production to the U.S. Department of the Interior.We determined that the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) discovered that the company’s recordkeeping contributed to a production reporting error of 400 barrels of oil, but an audit of the company’s operations did not disclose a loss of royalties. We found the company’s reported oil production volumes coincided with its recorded oil sales.

We investigated allegations that a senior political employee of the U.S. Department of the Interior (DOI) violated a Federal ethics pledge by meeting with a former employer during the required 2-year recusal period following the senior employee’s resignation from that organization. We also investigated whether this senior employee’s attendance at events hosted by the organization violated the section of the standards of ethical conduct for executive branch employees that governs the receipt of gifts from outside sources.We found that the senior employee attended two events hosted by the organization, and we determined that this was permissible under Federal gift rules for executive branch employees. In addition, we obtained no evidence that official DOI matters were discussed with the senior employee at either of the events; therefore, the senior employee’s actions on these occasions did not implicate Federal ethics rules or the ethics pledge.We provided a report on our investigation to the Chief of Staff for the Office of the Secretary for any action deemed appropriate.

Two senior-level employees in Washington, D.C., were counseled about misuse of company email as a result of an OIG investigation. The investigation found that the employees violated company policy by inappropriately using company e-mail to make political statements and to sending politically biased content to each other and to co-workers. The employees were counseled that personal political opinions should be kept separate and should not be associated with their Amtrak employment.

The OIG investigated allegations that Bronco Utah Operations, LLC (Bronco), a coal mining company based in Utah, improperly removed Federal coal without a lease.We determined that Bronco trespassed into unleased Federal coal deposits that resulted in a loss of public revenues. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) granted Bronco a right-of-way that allowed the company to tunnel through Federal land to continue the company’s coal operations designated by its mining plan. As the company tunneled through the right-of-way, it removed Federal coal deposits from areas outside the boundaries of the right-of-way, resulting in the removal of unleased deposits. As a result of the trespass, Bronco paid the Federal Government $92,099.44, a value based on an estimated bid for the coal removed and the mineral royalties owed if a Federal lease had been issued.