Spy chief who brought captives home from N. Korea describes tense moments in mission
WASHINGTON — When U.S. spy chief James Clapper flew to North Korea on a mission to bring home two U.S. captives, he ran into a potential hitch. North Korean officials wanted a diplomatic concession of some sort in return for freeing the men and Clapper had none to offer.
“I think they were disappointed,” Clapper said, fleshing out details of the secret trip a week after its completion.
It was not until he was ushered into a hotel room for an “amnesty-granting ceremony” that he knew the release of Americans Kenneth Bae and Matthew Miller would proceed as planned.
All told, the trip unfolded more smoothly than his first foray into North Korean air space, aboard a U.S. helicopter in December 1985.
“They shot at us, and fortunately we made it back to the South,” he told CBS’s “Face the Nation” in an interview broadcast Sunday. At the time, Clapper was intelligence chief for U.S. forces in South Korea. This time, he was a presidential emissary with a deal in the works and permission to land.
Lawyer: Bill Cosby won’t dignify ‘decade-old, discredited’ abuse allegations with response
LOS ANGELES — Bill Cosby will not dignify “decade-old, discredited” claims of sexual abuse with a response, his attorney said Sunday, the first comment from the famed comedian’s lawyer on an increasing uproar over allegations that he assaulted several women in the past.
In a statement released to The Associated Press and posted online, lawyer John P. Schmitt said the fact that the allegations are being repeated “does not make them true.”
“He would like to thank all his fans for the outpouring of support and assure them that, at age 77, he is doing his best work,” Schmitt said.
The renewed attention to a dark chapter for Cosby began last month when a comedian, Hannibal Buress, assailed him during a stand-up performance in Philadelphia, Cosby’s hometown, calling him a “rapist.” His remarks were captured on video and posted online, gaining wide exposure.
It was harsh criticism of the veteran entertainer known equally for his charming standup comedy, ethnically groundbreaking 1984-92 NBC TV sitcom “The Cosby Show” and demands for personal responsibility directed at fellow African-Americans.
Recruiting scams and kickback schemes: Prosecutors troubled by frequency of military fraud
WASHINGTON — Fabian Barrera found a way to make fast cash in the Texas National Guard, earning roughly $181,000 for claiming to have steered 119 potential recruits to join the military. But the bonuses were ill-gotten because the former captain never actually referred any of them.
Barrera’s case, which ended last month with a prison sentence of at least three years, is part of what Justice Department lawyers describe as a recurring pattern of corruption that spans a broad cross section of the military.
In a period when the nation has spent freely to support wars on multiple fronts, prosecutors have found plentiful targets: defendants who bill for services they do not provide, those who steer lucrative contracts to select business partners and those who use bribes to game a vast military enterprise.
Despite numerous cases that have produced long prison sentences, the problems have continued abroad and at home with a frequency that law enforcement officials consider troubling.
“The schemes we see really run the gamut from relatively small bribes paid to somebody in Afghanistan to hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of contracts being steered in the direction of a favored company who’s paying bribes,” Assistant Attorney General Leslie Caldwell, head of the Justice Department’s criminal division, said in an interview.
By wire sources