Accountability for Foreign Contractors: The Lieutenant Colonel Dominic ‘Rocky’ Baragona Justice for American Heroes Harmed by Contractors Act

Ad Hoc Subcommittee on Contracting Oversight

Wednesday, November 18, 2009
02:30 PM
Dirksen Senate Office Building, room SD-342

[view archive webcast]

On May 19, 2003, Lieutenant Colonel Dominic “Rocky” Baragona was killed in Safwan, Iraq, when his vehicle was struck by a truck being driven by an employee of the Kuwait & Gulf Link Transport Company (KGL), a Kuwaiti company with hundreds of millions of dollars in U.S. contracts and subcontracts. On May 12, 2005, Lt. Col. Baragona’s family brought a wrongful death claim against KGL in federal court in Georgia and won a $4.9 million default judgment. After KGL contested the judgment on the grounds of personal jurisdiction, the court found in KGL’s favor and vacated the judgment.

On March 4, 2009, Senator McCaskill introduced S. 526, the Lieutenant Colonel Dominic ‘Rocky’ Baragona Justice for American Heroes Harmed by Contractors Act. This legislation would require that contractors consent to the jurisdiction of federal courts for certain types of lawsuits as a condition of entering into government contracts. The proposed law would also amend the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) to provide that a U.S. government contractor may be debarred or suspended from contracting for evading service of process in such suits or refusing or failing to appear before a federal court.

The hearing reviewed the legislation and explore the breadth and depth of current legal ambiguities which are being utilized by foreign entities contracting with the federal government. The hearing also assessed the policy implications of current suspension and debarment practices throughout the government and question whether agencies and departments are fully utilizing the tools currently available to them to identify, prevent, and prosecute wrongdoing by contractors.

Additional information and materials relating to this hearing are available at http://mccaskill.senate.gov/issues/soco/docs.cfm

Member Statements

• Senator Claire McCaskill   [view statement]
• Senator Robert F. Bennett   [view statement]

Witnesses

Panel 1

• Mr. Dominic Baragona [view testimony]
  Father of Luietenant Colonel Dominic 'Rocky' Baragona
• Professor Scott Horton [view testimony]
  Lecturer-in-Law
  Columbia Law School
• Professor Ralph G. Steinhardt [view testimony]
  Professor of Law and International Affairs
  The George Washington University Law School

Panel 2

• Mr. Tony West [view testimony]
  Assistant Attorney General, Civil Division
  Department of Justice
• Mr. Richard T. Ginman [view testimony]
  Deputy Director for Program Acquisition and Contingency Contracting
  Department of Defense
• Mr. Uldric Fiore [view testimony]
  Suspension and Debarment Official, Army Legal Services Agency
  U.S. Army