Then Cmdr. David Haas. US Navy Photo
A former U.S. 7th Fleet operations officer was sentenced Thursday to 30 months in federal prison – two years after pleading guilty – for taking bribes in exchange for steering lucrative contracts to a foreign defense contractor. Read More
Interpol Venezuela Image
The extradition of international fugitive Leonard Francis from Venezuela to the United States could mark the start of a major shift in the relationship between Caracas and Washington, D.C., a Venezuelan legal expert told USNI News on Thursday. Read More
Interpol Venezuela Image
After two weeks on the run, authorities in Venezuela arrested former defense contractor Leonard “Fat Leonard” Francis as he attempted to board a plane to Russia, officials said late Wednesday. Read More
Retired Rear Adm. Bruce Loveless. US Navy Photo
This post has been updated to include the order to dismiss and to correct the firms that represented Loveless.
A federal court dismissed charges against a retired rear admiral arrested in 2017 for his alleged role in the “Fat Leonard” corruption scandal, according to a Thursday filing. Read More
U.S. Marshals wanted poster for Leonard Francis
An international manhunt continued Tuesday for Leonard Glenn Francis, a former defense contractor and convicted mastermind of a multimillion-dollar U.S. Navy corruption case who fled custody from home detention Sunday morning, just weeks before he was to be sentenced to federal prison. Read More
Capt. Donald Gayle Hornbeck
A former U.S. 7th Fleet operations officer pleaded guilty to bribery, admitting in a federal court Wednesday that he took nearly $68,000 in gifts that included extravagant meals, prostitutes and luxury hotel stays from defense contractor Glenn Defense Marine Asia, U.S. prosecutors announced Wednesday.
Undated photo of Leonard Francis
A former U.S. 7th Fleet staff officer and ship commander pleaded guilty Wednesday to two conspiracy charges in the major fraud and bribery case surrounding Glenn Defense Marine Asia and scores of Navy officials, U.S. prosecutors announced. Read More
Undated photo of Leonard Francis
A Marine Corps officer once assigned to U.S. 7th Fleet headquarters has admitted he accepted $67,000 in bribes and helped recruit others into a “cabal” of Navy officials who helped steer and inflate contracts to a Singapore-based defense firm, federal prosecutors said Friday. Read More
Undated photo of Leonard Francis
Nearly four-and-a-half years after his indictment, a former U.S. 7th Fleet official on Tuesday admitted he traded classified ship schedules in exchange for luxury hotel stays, meals and entertainment while helping a Singapore-based company secure inflated Navy ship husbanding contracts. Read More
USS Fitzgerald (DDG-62) departs Huntington Ingalls Industries – Ingalls Shipbuilding’s Pascagoula shipyard to conduct comprehensive at-sea testing on Feb. 3, 2020. US Navy Photo
The Navy’s surface warfare community is weighed with a culture that values administrative chores over training to fight, ship commanders that are micromanaged and an aversion to risk, according to a new survey overseen by a retired Navy admiral and Marine general at the behest of a group of Republican lawmakers. That culture was at least partially responsible for a string “of high-profile and damaging operational failures in the Navy’s Surface Warfare community,” the report found. Read More
