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Man Pleads Guilty To Selling Fake Chips To US Navy
itwbennett writes "Neil Felahy of Newport Coast, California, has pleaded guilty to conspiracy and counterfeit-goods trafficking for his role in a chip-counterfeiting scam. Felahy, along with his wife and her brother, operated several microchip brokerage companies under a variety of names, including MVP Micro, Red Hat Distributors, Force-One Electronics and Pentagon Components. 'They would buy counterfeit chips from China or else take legitimate chips, sand off the brand markings and melt the plastic casings with acid to make them appear to be of higher quality or a different brand,' the US Department of Justice said in a press release. The chips were then sold to Naval Sea Systems Command, the Washington, DC group responsible for maintaining the US Navy's ships and systems, as well as to an unnamed vacuum-cleaner manufacturer in the Midwest."
You know the penalty.
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
Because it was the free market and private enterprise that was doing the scamming?
And if they are willing to pull this on the gov't then it really doesn't bode well for the rest of us peons.
In other words the right to regulate chip counterfeiting belongs to your local State government, until you expand the Constitution with an amendment
Wrong. This is actually a proper use of the Interstate Commerce Clause. Now arresting some poor bastard for growing pot for his own personal use on the other hand.......
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Isn't there some confusion here? This is the free market at work; if it wasn't, the Navy would have their own fabs and employ wafer process techs as well as sailors and airplane mechanics. This is outside the brief of the government, especially the Navy, hence the government buying the fake chips from a private contractor. They didn't do enough due diligence and got burned -- isn't that what's supposed to happen when there's an information imbalance in a market?
I suggest you start a small business owned by a woman who is a minority.
Why is it (properly, IMHO) called racism and/or sexism if someone gives favoritism to a white male but doing the inverse is just fine and dandy?
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
What happened is that they went with the cheapest (lowest bid) contractor. The other guys who bid on the contract probably had legit chips to sell and couldn't compete with the cheaters.
This is why the government's practice of having to accept the lowest bid is just fucking dumb. They always get ripped off.
Look at any of your local construction projects. The lowest bidder got that job. Now the job is over budget and behind schedule.
They rarely go with the best, most qualified bidder.
That's a typo. I'm sure they've meant "UNMANNED vacuum-cleaner" like the Roomba.
Why is it (properly, IMHO) called racism and/or sexism if someone gives favoritism to a white male but doing the inverse is just fine and dandy?
2 generations ago: negros were riding on the back of the bus (1949)
3 generations ago: women hadn't yet been given the right to vote (1919)
The short version is: because we say so.
The full version might have something to do with the long and storied
history of racism, sexism, and exploitation throughout human history.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
The government is not at fault. The owner of those businesses is. The government looked for a seller within our free market, and that seller conspired to fool the government.
If anything, this says more negative about the free market, and the willingness of people to do illegal things out of selfish greed.
The government is the people. It is for the people, by the people. If the government is so "fucked up" as you say it is, than perhaps its just a reflection of our citizens.
We need to be BETTER PEOPLE for ourselves, and our fellow Americans.
I don't think this is an issue of Due Diligence - blame the goverment blah blah blah - it's an issue of THEY LIED. They stated the chips were one thing / one grade and turned out they were another grade entirely.
It's reasonable to expect regular consumers in the marketplace to perform due diligence but when a person claims the product is the product and it appears that way then the person has performed due deligence. Requiring the person to inspect fab plants and everything else for every manufacturer is not due diligence - it's a hassle.
Let's get out of this blame the government mantra - the politico talking heads are having enough fun as it is. This is a criminal issue for which the company should be nailed pretty harshly. The goverment should get it's retribution through whatever means are most expedient.
There's a gorilla from Manilla whose a fella that stinks of vanilla and has salmonella.
The full version might have something to do with the long and storied
history of racism, sexism, and exploitation throughout human history.
I see, so this is just history repeating itself.
For a moment there I thought two wrongs don't make a right.
What were white men doing two or three generations ago?
While some of them were probably benefiting greatly from institutionalized sexism and racism, others were part of the poor, downtrodden masses.
Even today, there are places that are very white and very poor, where there is little opportunity, and crime and poverty runs rampant.
So why do we assume all white men don't need any additional help?
Is it because of the color of their skin and their gender?
So... nobody else thought that the so called "Midwest vacuum cleaner manufacturer" could be a cover for the CIA or NHS?
Yep I suppose we're gonna get a whole bunch of these 'Counterfeit Goods' stories hitting the media in the next year or so to make people think we absolutely positively must pass the ACTA treaty the RIAA/MPAA have been working on in secret.
09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0
+2 Troll is Slashdot's way of saying groupthink is confused
This is the strangest definition of fraud. Smacks of a mail order degree in popular economics with hand typed training materials.
What a company is selling is a chip that conforms to its spec. sheet. If the military version has a different spec. sheet, they can charge any price they like for putting into effect the QC process which allows them to stand behind those claims.
It's not even in the military's interest to squeeze these vendors on price. That would only result in niche products the military depends upon being discontinued faster than ever. There's real cost here. You've got to keep some old guy around who remembers details about products you rarely sell, in case the military comes calling. If a company fails to maintain this courtesy, it won't long find itself on the preferred vendor list for new designs.
The way out of this price trap is for the military to toss their aircraft carriers onto the landfill at the same rate consumers dispose of their cell phones. Then they can quote for volume on parts rated for a short rough-and-tumble service life and only pay twice as much as the common man.