Sunday, January 12, 2014

DHECC - Comment Bump, Jan. 12, 2013 - $3 million a month?

There was some speculation in the T&A post comment section as to how much the Freeh Group/Pepper Hamilton are actually billing the DHECC.  This is a response from Anon:

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "DHECC: Tits and ass, corporate espionage, white-co...": 

I know that they have at least 42 people working here staying at the top hotels, eating at the top restaurants, renting out an entire floor of a class a building and building out more space, flying back and forth to DC every weekend, renting cars or drivers, hiring security and surveillance as well as top of the line electronics. Read the Penn State articles. Freeh typically charges $6m turnkey for a report that takes 2 months or less to produce. I doubt that the court paid him cash upfront in this case. The Sutton report took 2 months and he has been working on a second report for 4 months. $3 million per month is an educated guess.  


I've heard the 42 (approx.) number of employees from 2 other folks in the building as well...neither with the DHECC though.  3 million a month?  What the fuck are they doing in that office?  Freeh was hired to launch an investigation, not process claims.  So just so I understand this, the DHECC has payed Freeh possibly over 10 million dollars to claw back $357,000 from the Thonn claim?  Or are they now being paid to process claims?

That's the funny thing about this settlement...they, Barbier and Juneau, keep claiming the office isn't public but that they are being transparent to the public.  If that's truly the case, why was my FOIA denied, my personal letter to Judge Barbier left unanswered and how is it that this man hired to launch an investigation is now possibly running the office without any way for the public to find out what is really going on?

I guess they're practicing the Mayor Landrieu version of "transparency".

    

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Penn State commenters speculate that the number there us closer to $10 billion. Of course, the PS Trustees, like Juneau, won't share that information. Others claim that the Wynn/Okada report costs much more. If those numbers are correct, BP(?) is getting a bargain here.
"how is it that this man hired to launch an investigation is now possibly running the office without any way for the public to find out what is really going on?"
Is it even the Freeh Group or is it the law firm Pepper Hamilton? And if so, who hired them? The judge gave Louis Freeh claw back power as per the appointment. Did he also give him power to hire another law firm with an open checkbook? Where is that order and why that law firm? Could it be that Freeh has a financial interest in PH? I am sure there were other local firms available. Or for that matter, why does he even need a law firm. The DHECC already had an investigation unit in place being run be ex FBI agent in charge, David Welker. Certainly Welker and his team are trustworthy. Wasn't he just promoted to COO?
One more thing. Freeh required Penn State to sign a defense and indemnity agreement, including paying Freeh for the time he spent defending any lawsuits. Did Freeh have the same requirement here? If so, who is responsible? Or was that why he was made a Special Master? Instead of indemnity, he gets Judicial Immunity.

Anonymous said...

Please read the James Gill story in today's Advocate. Looks like BP has their hands in everything.

Kevin said...

Ninthwarder, is that you!

Did you look at the information on here about Judge Dennis and his relationships with PSC members?

Anonymous said...

The Freeh claw back amount is wrong. The settlement only allows reimbursement of 2% of the calculated damage( excluding RTP). See sec: 4.4.13.7
To imply Coastal Claims Group actually received $20 K from the settlement compared to invoicing the firm for the work they provided is incorrect. In order to receive(reimbursement)of the accounting fees the settlement requires an invoice that's broken down by the hour listing supervision review or preparation.

The only way the firm could receive 20K in accounting reimbursement is if the calculated loss was One million dollars.

Something doesn't smell right.
See if you can locate the Thonn offer line 3 will confirm the accounting reimbursement amount.