Another US Navy official suspended in bribery scandal

Another US Navy official has been suspended over ties to a growing bribery scandal involving Navy officials and a military contractor.

On Thursday, the US Navy announced that Captain David Haas, 45, was suspended from his job as deputy commander of Coastal Riverine Group One and “temporarily reassigned” to a training staff.

The Navy has said the decision “was made based upon allegations in connection” with a criminal investigation into Navy officials’ ties to a military contractor, Glenn Defense Marine Asia.

The chief executive of Singapore-based Glenn Defense Marine Asia, Leonard Glenn Francis, was arrested in September over charges that he bribed Navy officers with prostitutes and cash in order to gain access to classified and privileged information.

According to US government documents, the Singapore-based firm, which provides port services for US ships in Southeast Asia, won $200 million contracts to provide fuel, food, and other services to US warships by submitting very low bids.

The investigation is now being conducted by the Naval Criminal Investigative Service and the Department of Justice.

Capt. Haas became the seventh official linked to the criminal investigation against whom the Navy has taken action.

Earlier this month, the Navy’s director of intelligence operations, Rear Adm. Bruce F. Loveless, and the service’s top intelligence officer, Vice Adm. Ted Branch, were also placed on temporary leave and their access to classified material was suspended over ties to the bribery scandal.

The implication of two of the Navy’s senior intelligence officials, who were responsible for protecting the secrets of one of the service branches of the US military, in the scandal raised great concerns over whether US national security was compromised in exchange for bribes.

According to The Washington Post, the scandal is the US Navy’s worst since the 1991 Tailhook scandal, when over 100 US Navy and Marine Corps aviation officers sexually assaulted scores of women and men.