DIA chief used taxpayer funds for 'personal limousine service'

WASHINGTON, March 28 (UPI) -- The inspector general for the Department of Defense found that the former acting head of the Defense Intelligence Agency used tax dollars for what amounted to a "personal limousine service," according to recently released documents.

A Pentagon report, obtained recently through a Freedom of Information Act request by the Washington Post, found that former acting DIA director David R. Shedd's 25-mile commute from his home in Vienna, Va., to the agency's Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling in Washington, D.C., "could be characterized as a personal limousine service based solely on reasons of rank, position, prestige or personal convenience."

"We initiated this investigation to address allegations that Mr. David R. Shedd... misused a government-owned vehicle and his subordinates' time, and improperly used non-contract air carriers for official travel," the document states.

Shedd served as deputy director of the Defense Intelligence Agency from August 2010 until August 2014, and served as acting director from August 2014 until his retirement in January 2015. He was previously an operative with the Central Intelligence Agency and also served on the National Security Council.

The report concluded Shedd made 43 trips to the base that were home-to-work trips at taxpayers' expense. The inspector general also found that Shedd made "40 trips to and from restaurants ... without sufficient explanation for why those locations on those occasions were essential to accomplishing the DIA mission."

When asked to explain why he used government services to travel for lunch, Shedd said it was because "the food at the DIA cafeteria was poor." Shedd is also accused of failing to use airlines contracted with the U.S. government when booking overseas flights so he could avoid layovers and at times upgraded seating arrangements.

Shedd told the Washington Post that his travel arrangements were approved by the DIA's general counsel and that he drove his own car to DIA headquarters as much as 50 percent of the time, saying that "the use of the vehicles was 100 percent for work, to and from another U.S. government facility."