Will the Exclusive Remedy continue to condone murder or will G4S/ArmorGroup finally be held responsible for the murders of Paul McGuigan and Darren Hoare?????

WARNINGS ABOUT KILLER OF SCOT WENT UNHEEDED  October 1, 2012

ArmorGroup put the gun in his hand knowing that he was troubled

CONTROVERSIAL security firm G4S ignored warnings not to employ an armed guard in Iraq who went on to murder two of his colleagues, it has been claimed.

Danny Fitzsimons was sentenced to at least 20 years in an Iraqi prison last year for killing Scot Paul McGuigan and Australian Darren Hoare in Baghdad in 2009.The parents of Paul McGuigan, 37, have now called for G4S ArmorGroup to face criminal charges for failing to heed the warnings and sending Fitzsimons to Iraq.Now a new BBC Scotland documentary has revealed that G4S was warned not to employ Fitzsimons, who was suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, and had been fired by a previous security contractor for punching a client.It emerged that a whistleblower sent two e-mails to the London-based company, which operates as Armorgroup in Iraq, expressing concerns that Fitzsimons’ unstable behaviour made him unsuitable to be handling weapons in a war zone.

The first e-mail, revealed in tonight’s BBC Scotland Investigates: Britain’s Private War programme, reads: “I am alarmed that he will shortly be allowed to handle a weapon and be exposed to members of the public. I am speaking out because I feel that people should not be put at risk.”And in a second e-mail, sent as 32-year-old Fitzsimons was about to start work in Baghdad, the whistleblower adds:“Having made you aware of the issues regarding the violent criminal Danny Fitzsimons, it has been noted that you have not taken my advice and still choose to employ him in a position of trust.

“I have told you that he remains a threat and you have done nothing.”Paul McGuigan’s mother, Corinne Boyd-Russell, from Innerleithen, in Peebleshire, said: “Fitzsimons fired the bullets. But the gun was put in his hand by G4S ArmorGroup.“I want G4S to be charged with corporate manslaughter and be held accountable for what they did.”The parents of Fitzsimons were also shocked to hear about the existence of the e-mails.Mother Liz Fitzsimons, from Manchester, said: “The people who we feel are responsible, who we hold responsible for putting that gun in Danny’s hand, are without a shadow of a doubt G4S.”The news comes just months after the UK Government was forced to call in 1,200 troops to police the Olympic Games venues after G4S failed to provide enough staff.

The firm recently won a £20million contract to manage the electronic tagging of Scottish offenders.

A spokesman for G4S said: “Although there was evidence that Mr Fitzsimons falsified and apparently withheld material information during the recruitment process, his screening was not completed in line with the company’s procedures.

“Our screening processes should have been better implemented in this situation, but it is a matter of speculation what, if any, role this may have played in the incident.”

Family of Daniel Saville still fighting for Defense Base Act Death Benefits

The family has also been told that Global Security, the company he was working for at the time, had refused to pay out his life insurance

Telegraph and Argus August 20, 2012

Family Battles for Truth About Fatal Plane Crash Two Years On

The family of a soldier turned bodyguard who was killed in a plane crash in Afghanistan more than two years ago is still battling for a full explanation as to what led to the disaster.

Rebecca Lake, said her family was being “kept in the dark” despite an on-going fight for justice for her brother Daniel Saville, 40, a former Coldstream guard, who was among three Britons who perished when Pamir Airways Flight 1102 crashed north of Kabul, Afghanistan, on May 17, 2010.

Mr Saville, who grew up in Wilsden , Haworth and Allerton , Bradford, had been only a few weeks away from his return to Britain from working as a private security contractor for a US government agency trying to combat the cultivation of heroin.

A damning official report blaming the failure of the aircraft’s captain and Afghan air traffic control for causing the disaster has been obtained from the Foreign Office by the Telegraph & Argus using the Freedom of Information Act.

But Mrs Lake, 45, of Clayton Heights , Bradford, has made a fresh plea to the authorities to keep her family fully informed of developments as lawyers continue a compensation battle in the US for the British victims of the doomed plane which had been flying on false documents.

She said that, despite investigations in the war-torn country, it had been “difficult” for the Afghan authorities to fully investigate and bring to justice those who were to blame for causing her brother’s death.

The family has also been told that Global Security, the company he was working for at the time, had refused to pay out his life insurance.

Please read the entire article here

Eight Civilian Contractors, some Fluor Employees, killed in Kabul Suicide Car Bombing

It was initially reported that 12 American Soldiers were killed in this blast.  It is now being reported that eight of these killed were contractors.  It is also being reported that two of the Contractors Killed were British Electricians and were working for a building contractor, Fluor

Fluor Corp., a company based in Irving, Texas, that employs contractors in Afghanistan, confirmed on Sunday that some of its employees, including the two British nationals, were killed in the attack. Their names were not being released out of respect for their families, said Keith Stephens, a company representative.

One Kosovar National reported killed.

Scotsman October 31, 2011

The British contractors were named locally as Stephen Brown, 52, and David Quinn, 34. Both men were electricians, employed by the Texas-based engineering company Fluor. Their bodies were due to be repatriated last night. “The company has notified the families involved,” said Fluor spokesman Keith Stephens. “Our thoughts and prayers are with the family, friends and loved ones of our co-workers. Right now our focus is helping them.”

About 165 civilian contractors are thought to have died in Afghanistan since 2001, but just six of them were British, and five worked as security guards.????????

Fluor Contractors killed

The British contractors were working for the Texas-based construction and engineering firm Fluor, which has extensive contracts with Nato forces in Afghanistan, including managing essential facilities on army bases all over the country.

9 Americans among Kabul suicide blast victims

Kabul, Afghanistan (CNN) — Nine American, including four U.S. troops, were among those killed in a suicide bombing in Afghanistan’s capital this weekend, a western diplomat told CNN Sunday.

Saturday’s blast — which also claimed the lives of two British civilians, a Kosovo naitonal and a Canadian soldier — occurred when a car packed with explosives struck an armored bus in a NATO convoy, the diplomat said.

Confusion over casualties arose because some people onboard the bus were not listed on its passenger manifest, the diplomat said.

Afghan officials said four Afghans, including two students, were also killed.

A senior NATO official described the bus as a custom-built, heavily armored Rhino

12 Americans Die as Blast Hits Bus in Afghanistan

KABUL, Afghanistan — At least 12 Americans were killed when a Taliban suicide car bomber attacked an armored shuttle bus in Kabul on Saturday, military officials said

The bombing was the single deadliest assault on Americans in the capital since the war began, military officials said, and follows brazen Taliban attacks on the American Embassy and NATO headquarters in the city last month.

A Western defense official said at least four of the dead Americans were G.I.’s and the rest were contract workers; a Canadian soldier and four Afghans were also reported to be killed

2 British civilians among those killed in suicide bombing of NATO convoy in Kabul

KABUL, Afghanistan — Britain’s Foreign Office says two British civilians working for a building contractor were among the victims of a weekend suicide bombing of a NATO convoy in Kabul that killed 17.

A Taliban suicide bomber rammed a vehicle loaded with explosives into an armored NATO bus on a busy thoroughfare in Kabul on Saturday, killing five NATO service members, including one Canadian soldier, eight civilian contractors and four Afghans

500 hidden victims of terror war

New probe into MoD’s contractors

The Ministry of Defence has suffered twice as many deaths in the war against terror than have previously been reported.

There have officially been 524 deaths of troops and civilians working for the MoD in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts since 9/11 in 2001. But a shocking report will claim there have also been more than 500 unreported deaths – all civilian contractors paid for by the MoD.

Last night a top British military source said: “It is terribly sad so many civilians have been killed while working for the MoD and they should be remembered.

“Most were foreign workers but contracted by the MoD nevertheless, and part of the budgeted force level in both war zones of Afghanistan and Iraq.”

Even though they are largely Afghan, Indian and Iraqi, they were employed by the MoD and counted as part of the UK military force in both countries.

And these figures do not count the hundreds of ex-military Brits killed while working in the private security sector in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In the case of Afghanistan many work for a company called Supreme, which supplies food and fuel and bills itself as providing “global service solutions”.

But Supreme, according to a military source, are actually contracted by the MoD. Our source added: “Whether they are employed by the MoD or sub-contracted by Supreme is semantics. The MoD is paying them and their deaths should be recorded in public.”

The report, by Andrew Higginson for think-tank the Royal United Services Institute, discusses the number of personnel deployed to the Afghanistan war zone – Operation Herrick, and Iraq – Operation Telic.

It says: “The force level for Operation Herrick in the area of operations is in the region of 10,000 military personnel. “And there are also 6,500 contracted personnel, making a total of 16,500. Analysis by the author for the Aerospace, Defence and Security Trade Association shows that 500 contracted employees on MoD contracts on Operations Telic and Herrick have been killed since 2003.”

The MoD said last night: “Providing support to international military operations is an inherently risky business and sadly one that can lead to the loss of life.

“This is vital work and requires a range of professionals both internationally and locally employed to deliver. As part of the contracting process, interested companies are aware of the risks involved in delivering on contracts in hostile environments.”  Please read the original article here

Karl Bowen, Private Security Contractor, Killed in Iraq

Wales Online September 23

A VALLEY man has been killed while working for a security firm out in Iraq.

For eight years Karl Bowen, 30, of Abercwmboi, served in 2 Company 1st Battalion Welsh Guards, touring war-torn countries like Bosnia and Iraq.

In 2007 he was discharged from the Army and began working in HR recruitment – but decided that life on ‘civvy street’ was not for him.

Earlier this year he returned to Iraq to work for a close protection unit. He died in a freak road accident in Iraq on September 14.

Tributes have flooded in describing Mr Bowen as a great father, a “legend”, and an outstanding friend and football player who was the life and soul of the party and lived life to the extreme.

A father of two young girls, Elise, 11, and eight-year-old Lois, Mr Bowen had returned to Iraq just days before the car he was driving suffered a double blow out. He was killed instantly in the crash alongside an Iraqi interpreter and an American colleague was critically injured.

His distraught mother Clare Bowen said: “He always said he would not live to see his 31st birthday.

“Karl was never afraid to die, and he lived his life to the full.

“He fitted so much into such a short time – he was very intelligent and an absolute party animal. He had hundreds of friends.

“Life on civvy street was just not for him. He wanted to go back to the Army, but he couldn’t so he decided to take up this job.”

The former Blaengwawr Comprehensive School pupil started his army career with the Welsh Guards in November 1999.

His career took him to Bosnia on a peacekeeping mission in 2002 and again in 2006, and to Iraq in 2004 after qualifying as a sniper.

In 2007 he left the army and worked as a recruitment consultant before joining a private security company, working in Iraq for seven months.

Mr Bowen’s body has been flown to Kuwait while paperwork is completed.

It is expected to be flown to Cardiff later this week so that his family can organise funeral arrangements.

“The last few days have been an absolute mess for us – his younger brother Adam is in bits,” said his mother.