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Cellphone video recorded earlier this year at an operations center of a U.S. defense contractor in
Kabul, Afghanistan appears to show key personnel staggeringly drunk or high on narcotics, in what
former employees say was a pattern of outrageous behavior that put American lives at risk and went
undetected by U.S. military officials who are supposed to oversee such contractors.
The video, provided to ABC News by two former employees, is scheduled to be broadcast in a report
this evening on "ABC World News with Diane Sawyer" and "Nightline."
WATCH a short clip from the video
Asked if a response to an attack by terrorists would have been possible during the events seen on
the video, one of the former employees, Kenny Smith, told ABC News Chief Investigative
Correspondent Brian Ross, "No, sir."
Questions posed by ABC News to the Pentagon have sparked a criminal investigation by the U.S.
Army, a spokesman says.
The contractor, Virginia-based Jorge Scientific, has won almost $1 billion in U.S. government
contracts.
The company says it has taken "decisive action to correct the unacceptable behavior of a limited
number of employees" and that several of them seen on the video are no longer employed by Jorge
Scientific.
READ the full statement from Jorge Scientific
The use of alcohol or illegal drugs by U.S. contractors in Afghanistan is prohibited by the military
under what is known as General Order Number One.
Yet the former employees told ABC News they saw no evidence of oversight of the company by
American military officials and that at least one U.S. Army major, a female, was a regular visitor to
drunken parties at the facility, often using a room for sexual encounters.
The two former employees, John Melson and Kenny Smith, say the video documents allegations they
have made in a lawsuit against Jorge Scientific.
"They endangered Jorge employees, the U.S. mission, and U.S.
Act, designed to give the government an opportunity to join the legal effort to see if the government
was defrauded. In this case, the Department of Justice declined to become part of the fraud lawsuit
and apparently did not notify the U.S. Army of the allegations.
After ABC News first asked questions of the Pentagon, agents of the Army's Criminal Investigations
Division have sought to interview the two men, according to their lawyer, David Scher, a principal at
the Employment Law Group in Washington, D.C.
"I think the company's conduct far exceeds that of a mere drunken brawl, and drunken activities,"
said Scher. "It leads to a very severe security risk in Afghanistan when that is the last thing that we
need."
In its statement to ABC News, Jorge said it made management changes in Afghanistan even before
the two former employees filed their lawsuit.
"These individuals are seeking monetary damages by mischaracterizing these actions as 'fraud,'" the
company said of the behavior at the facility.
Jorge said its board of directors hired an "outside and independent investigative team headed by a
former federal prosecutor to conduct a thorough investigation."
"The company remains confident that the personal misconduct did not impact the company's
contract performance," the statement read.
A senior U.S. official in Afghanistan told ABC News that if the allegations prove to be true, the
company "should be kicked out of here fast" given concerns that such behavior could add to rage
over perceived U.S. disrespect for local values.
"This arrogant image that Americans have worldwide, this was feeding right into it," said one of the
whistleblowers, John Melson, a National Guard sergeant who served in uniform in Iraq and
Afghanistan before working for Jorge Scientific.
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