Old news...
Brief mention of von Ackermann and Manelick in an appendix provided with testimony at an Oversight Hearing for the House Judiciary Committee. Quotes and cites the 2005 article, Foul Play in Iraq? by Doug Waller in Time magazine.
Hearing on: War Profiteering and Other Contractor Crimes Committed Overseas
Tuesday 06/19/2007 - 2:00 PM
2141 Rayburn House Office Building
Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security
Testimony of Scott Horton (PDF), Adjunct Professor of Law Columbia University School of Law New York, NY, page 10
AppendixYou'd probably like an update on where things stand these days. In my corner of the world, it's been fairly quiet behind the scenes. As far as I know, there's only one new project still due for release that looks into the events surrounding von Ackermann and Manelick. The investigation sounds like it is at a dead end for the time being.
Incidents Involving Military Contractors Where Investigation and Potentially Law Enforcement Action is Indicated
Disappearance of American Contractor
“On Oct. 9, 2003, Kirk von Ackermann, 37, was driving alone in northern Iraq when he pulled off the road with a flat tire and phoned the Kirkuk office of his employer - Ultra Services, based in Winters, Calif. - for help. A colleague arrived later to find the car but not Von Ackermann.”11
“Two months later, north of Baghdad, gunmen in an SUV shot and killed Ryan Manelick, 31, another Ultra Services employee, and an Iraqi traveling with him by car.
More...
I still have a lot of mundane questions and am thinking of just going ahead and posting them. Here's one question, just to give you an idea of what keeps me awake some times:
Where did Kirk von Ackermann get his car?Did he drive it from Istanbul and if so, was it a company car? Personal, borrowed, rental, lease, purchase, Istanbul, etc.
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2 comments:
Susie -
I can sort of answer this. According to the CID, Kirk bought that car in Iraq. Further than that I do not know. They also told me that the car he bought was supposedly the type that Iraqis think CIA agents drive (or that CIA agents actually do drive - can't tell which from my notes). This sounds odd to me as A. if it were true Kirk would know this and would not purchase the car and B. why on earth would the CIA drive consistent types of cars?
Also, we haven't heard anything more from the CID since our meeting last year. Since they pretty firmly detached Kirk's investigation from Ryan's we naturally aren't getting any updates on that side of things. As far as I can tell they feel that Kirk's situation is "resolved" as much as it can be.
That doesn't make sense on so many levels, I'm not sure what to think. It makes my head hurt.
You see, my second question is: why didn't Kirk take a more defensive position, take the satellite phone -- probably similar to a Thuraya with GPS -- and wait away from the car? That response would have been more consistent with his background and training as described in your own blog entry: No One Left Behind.
Think I'll go dust off my list of questions.
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