A6 Saturday, July 14, 2012
NATION/OBITUARIES/RECORDS
Roswell Daily Record
Billions likely wasted in Iraq work Feds charge 2 with trying to export nuclear-related material to Iran WASHINGTON (AP) — After years of following the paper trail of $51 billion in U.S. taxpayer dollars provided to rebuild a broken Iraq, the U.S. gover nment can say with certainty that too much was wasted. But it can’t say how much. In what it called its final audit report, the Of fice of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction Funds on Friday spelled out a range of accounting weaknesses that put “billions of American taxpayer dollars at risk of waste and misappropriation” in the largest reconstruction project of its kind in U.S. history. The auditors found huge problems accounting for the huge sums, but one small example of failure stood out: A contractor got away with charging $80 for a pipe fitting that its competitor was selling for $1.41. Why? The company’s billing documents were reviewed sloppily by U.S. contracting of ficers or were not reviewed at all. Inspector general’s of fice has spent more than $200 million tracking the reconstruction
OBITUARIES
Dale Freiberger
On Saturday, July 21, 2012, at 9:30 a.m., a burial service for Dale Freiberger will be conducted at South Park Cemetery. Friends of Dale and Billie are welcome to attend. Following the service, Billie (Grantham) Freiberger and her family will be receiving friends at First United Methodist Church. Dale passed away in Longview, Wash., on Feb. 23, 2012.
Agustin Juarez Corona
ARTESIA — A memorial gathering is scheduled from 1 to 5 p.m., Monday, July 16, 2012, at Terpening & Son Mortuary for Agustin Juarez Corona, 50, of Artesia, who died Sunday, July 8, 2012, at Eastern New Mexico Medical Center in Roswell. There will be a military salute on Monday at 6 p.m. at 307 S. 19th St., Artesia. Parking will be available at Faith Baptist Church. Cremation is under the direction of Terpening & Son Mortuary. Agustin was born July 12, 1961, in Artesia, the
PUBLIC RECORDS
Accidents July 3 4:17 p.m. — 4501 N. Main; drivers — Gilbert Salaz, 60, and Fred Moran, 59, both of Roswell. July 12 11:45 a.m. — 2725 N. Main parking lot; vehicle owned by Rachel Durand, of Shawnee, Okla., and unknown driver.
funds, and in addition to producing numerous reports, his of fice has investigated criminal fraud that has resulted in 87 indictments, 71 convictions and $176 million in fines and other penalties. These include civilians and military members accused of kickbacks, bribery, bid-rigging, fraud, embezzlement and outright theft of government property and funds. Much, however, apparently got overlooked. Example: A $35 million Pentagon project was started in December 2006 to establish the Baghdad airport as an international economic gateway, and the inspector general found that by the end of 2010 about half the money was “at risk of being wasted” unless someone else completed the work. Of the $51 billion that Congress approved for Iraq reconstruction, about $20 billion was for rebuilding Iraqi security forces and about $20 billion was for rebuilding the country’s basic infrastructure. The programs were run mainly by the
son of Agustin S. Corona and Susie (Juarez) Corona. He was a lifelong Artesia resident. He served his country in the United States Marine Corps. On June 7, 2003, he was married to Liza Weimer in Artesia. Agustin was a truck driver for Navajo Refinery and a member of Spanish Assembly of God. He loved to play softball, the Dallas Cowboys and the Marines. He was preceded in death by his mother and his brother Henry Corona. Survivors include his wife Liza Corona, of the family home; daughters, Morisal Medina, of Roswell, and Rosanna D'Amico and husband Ezio, of Artesia; sons, Joseph Weimer and wife See, of Sacramento, Calif., Air man James Weimer and wife Crystal, of New Jersey, and Christian Nielsen and fiancée Erica Close, of Portales; sister Rachel Bustos and husband Richard, of Las Cruces; father Agustin S. Corona, of Artesia; seven grandchildren; nephews, Cloud Corona, Micah Corona, and Zacky Corona; and niece Gabi “Puppett” Corona. Arrangements have been entrusted to Terpening & Son Mortuary. Please express condolences at artesiafunerals.com.
Sandra Vale
Services are pending at Ballard Funeral Home and Crematory for Sandra Vale, 50, who passed away Thursday, July 12, 2012. A further announcement will be made once arrangements have been finalized.
Stoney Waide
Funeral services are pending for Stoney Waide, 46, of Clovis, who died Tuesday July 10, 2012, at Clovis Healthcare and Rehabilitation. Services have been entrusted to Muf fley Funeral Home, 575-762-4435, muffleyfuneralhome.com.
5:12 p.m. — Twin Diamond and Encanto; drivers — Charolette Najar, 48, of Roswell, and unknown driver.
7:05 p.m. — Main and Wilshire; drivers — Adriana Sanchez, 16, and Lori Scarpa, 45, both of Roswell.
Defense Department, the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development. A key weakness found by inspectors was inadequate reviewing of contractors’ invoices. In some cases invoices were checked months after they had been paid because there were too few government contracting officers. Inspectors found a case in which the State Department had only one contracting officer in Iraq to validate more than $2.5 billion in spending on a DynCorp contract for Iraqi police training. “As a result, invoices were not properly reviewed, and the $2.5 billion in U.S. funds were vulnerable to fraud and waste,” the report said. “We found this lack of control to be especially disturbing since earlier reviews of the DynCorp contract had found similar weaknesses.” In that case, the State Department eventually reconciled all of the old invoices and as of July 2009 had recovered more than $60 million.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Two men have been charged with trying to illegally export nuclear-related material to Iran that could be used in gas centrifuges to enrich uranium, the Justice Department announced Friday. A grand jury indictment in the case also charged one of the men with conspiring to procure radioactive material from the United States for customers in Iran. Parviz Khaki, a citizen of Iran, was arrested in May by authorities in the Philippines on a U.S. provisional arrest request. The other man, Zongcheng Yi, a resident of China, is a fugitive. The grand jury charged that in 2008, Khaki asked someone in China to obtain 20 tons of C-350 maraging steel from the U.S. for Khaki’s customer in Iran. The enhanced strength of maraging steel is especially suited in gas centrifuges for uranium enrichment. Khaki also communicated with Yi about buying 20 tons of maraging steel from a U.S. company with which Yi was in contact. In pursuit of maraging
steel, Khaki allegedly began communicating with an undercover U.S. federal agent posing as an illegal exporter of U.S. goods. Khaki also is accused of seeking to obtain mass spectrometers from the U.S. In May 2009, Khaki allegedly asked the undercover agent to buy radioactive materials from a U.S. company, including barium-133 and europium152. In January 2011, Khaki again asked the undercover agent to purchase radioactive sources. Khaki allegedly sent the agent a product catalog for radioactive materials, including cobalt-57. In another email, he requested that the agent purchase cadmium-109. According to federal law enforcement officials, the probe began in 2008 when the Seattle office of ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations directorate engaged in routine outreach to the business community in the Pacific Northwest and one U.S. company relayed a suspicious event. A supposed Chinese toy company wanted to place an order
for 20 tons of maraging steel, a product for which no toy company could possibly have any legitimate use.
HSI decided to investigate using an undercover agent to contact the Chinese company, which didn’t respond. Eventually, the same U.S. company that had originally alerted ICE reported getting an identical request for maraging steel from a Chinese man, who turned out to be Yi. Yi referred the undercover agent to Yi’s boss, Khaki.
Khaki and Yi are each charged with one count of conspiracy to violate the International Emergency Economic Powers Act by conspiring with others to export U.S. goods to Iran without a required U.S. T reasury Department license. Both are also charged with one count of conspiring to defraud the U.S., two counts of smuggling, two counts of illegally exporting U.S. goods to Iran in violation of IEEPA and one count of conspiracy to engage in money laundering.
Producer Richard Zanuck dead at 77 LOS ANGELES (AP) — Film producer Richard Zanuck, who won the best picture Oscar for Driving Miss Daisy and was involved in such blockbuster films as Jaws and The Sting after his father, Hollywood mogul Darryl F. Zanuck, fired him from 20th Century Fox, died Friday. He was 77. Zanuck’s publicist says he died of a heart attack at his Beverly Hills home. Zanuck’s run of successes as an independent producer rivaled the achievements of his legendary father who reigned over 20th Century Fox from the 1930s until age and changing audience tastes brought him down. The production company the younger Zanuck founded with David Brown produced The Sting in 1973, as well as Steven Spielberg’s first feature film, The Sugarland Express, in 1974 and Spielberg’s first blockbuster, Jaws, in 1975. The Sting also won the best movie Oscar, although Zanuck and Brown were not listed as its producers. Jaws was nominated for best picture, as was the Zanuckproduced The Verdict. “In 1974, Dick Zanuck and I sat in a boat of f Martha’s Vineyard and watched the mechanical shark sink to the bottom of the sea,” Spielberg recalled in a statement Friday. “Dick turned to me and smiled. ‘Gee, I sure hope that’s not a sign.’ That moment forged a bond between us that lasted nearly 40 years. He taught me everything I know about producing. He was one of the most honorable and loyal men of our profession and he fought tooth and nail for his directors.” Zanuck most recently produced the big-screen adaptation of the cult classic TV series “Dark Shadows,” directed by Tim Burton and starring Johnny Depp and Michelle Pfeiffer. Other Zanuck films include MacArthur and Cocoon. In 1976, Zanuck and Brown announced a
much-publicized deal with the estate of novelist Margaret Mitchell to produce a sequel to Gone With the Wind. A book and script were prepared, but the project never materialized on film. In 1988, Zanuck and Brown dissolved their partnership amicably, and Zanuck for med a new venture with his third wife, Lili Fini Zanuck. They won the Oscar with their first movie together, Driving Miss Daisy. “Richard was a good and longtime friend,” said Morgan Freeman, who costarred with Jessica Tandy in the 1989 film. “A very fine producer who was wonderful to work for and with.” The contrasts between Richard and Darryl Zanuck were many and led to father-son clashes throughout their respective careers. Richard Zanuck was reserved, soft-spoken and friendly with directors, writers and actors, and he liked to operate from behind his desk. His authoritarian father, on the other hand, paced his office, issuing orders in a squeaky voice and sometimes wielding a polo mallet (in his early years he had played polo with other Hollywood figures). He would reach decisions quickly, and once he did they became studio law. But after decades of success, the studio began to flounder under his rein in the 1960s when the big-budget movie musical era died and films such as Doctor Dolittle, Star! and Hello, Dolly failed to earn their money back. Under pressure from the board of directors, he fired his son in 1970 in an effort to save his own job, but the maneuver failed and he soon followed him out the door. The dismissal shattered the younger Zanuck, and it was not until shortly before Darryl Zanuck’s death in 1979 that the pair resolved their differences. “It was different from the usual father-son relationship,” Zanuck told The New York T imes in
AP Photo
Producers Richard D. Zanuck and Lili Fini Zanuck accept Oscars for best picture of the year for Driving Miss Daisy at the 62nd annual Academy Awards in Los Angeles, March 26, 1990. 2003. “But I was able to patch everything up before my father died.” His ouster had not been the first time the Zanucks left Fox. During an earlier period of financial trouble, Darryl Zanuck was fired in 1956 by the studio’s board of directors and had become an independent producer, operating from Paris, where he had affairs with three French actresses in succession. He also sponsored their careers, but with little success. While he was making a film in Africa, he appointed his son Richard, who had left Fox after his father’s ouster, to produce a drama based on the Leopold-Loeb murder case of the 1920s. The result, 1959’s Compulsion. Soon after, Zanuck’s father embarked on The Longest Day, a costly film about World War II’s DDay and its after math, with realistic battle scenes and dozens of well-known actors. He brought his son on as executive producer, and the film was one of the biggest hits of 1962. Fox, still struggling, decided to rehire Zanuck in 1962 as company president and he appointed Richard as production chief. His reign brought one huge hit, The Sound of Music but such other so-so films as Crack in the Mirror, William Faulkner’s Sanctuary and Star!
After his success with Driving Miss Daisy, Richard Zanuck continued as an independent producer. Among his films: Rush (directed by Lili Fini Zanuck), Chain Reaction, Along Came a Spider, Rules of Engagement, Planet of the Apes 2001, The Road to Perdition and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Richard Darryl Zanuck was bor n in 1934, the third child and only son of the mercurial mogul and his wife, former actress Virginia Fox Zanuck. His mother had appeared in several Buster Keaton shorts in the years before her marriage to the elder Zanuck in 1924. Richard Zanuck had grown up at 20th Century Fox, once recalling, “When I was a kid I was playing hide-and-seek on the movie back lot.” As a student at a military school and later at Stanford University, he had worked summers at the studio in various departments, including editing and story. After graduation, he became a special assistant to his father. Richard Zanuck’s first wife was actress Lili Gentle and the couple had two daughters, Virginia and Janet. His second wife was also an actress, Linda Harrison, and they had two sons, Harrison and Dean. Both marriages ended in divorce.
S u p p o r t t h e U n i t e d Wa y