California National Guard bonus program riddled with corruption

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California National Guard bonus program riddled with corruption
By Charles Piller, The Sacramento Bee | The Sacramento Bee
Posted on Sunday, October 10, 2010

SACRAMENTO — Master Sgt. Toni Jaffe was known as "the M&M lady" because she decorated her office cubicle with keepsakes of the confection's advertising characters.

However, the treats she dispensed were sweeter than candy and are now the subject of a criminal investigation.

From 1986 until her retirement last year, Jaffe's job with the California Army National Guard was to give away money — the federally subsidized student-loan repayments and cash bonuses — paid for by federal taxpayers nationwide — that the Guard is supposed to use to attract new recruits and encourage Guard members to reenlist.

Instead, according to a Guard auditor turned federal whistle-blower, as much as $100 million has gone to soldiers who didn't qualify for the incentives, including some who got tens of thousands of dollars more than the program allows.

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Still, he said, the scale and audacity of the corruption he encountered in reviewing the California program shocked him: Excluding $43 million in improper payments recently halted by Jaffe's replacements, Clark estimated that $100 million was misspent. He called it "war profiteering."