The Cunningham Case, the CIA and Off-the-Books Planes. As I have already reported, alleged Cunningham co-conspirator #1 Brent Wilkes already got a couple smallish CIA contracts ($5 million to $10 million/year deals each), through a company nominally owned by his nephew and former ADCS and Group W Advisors employee, Joel G. Combs, called Archer Logistics. As I reported in December, one contract dates to 2003 and was to supply water to CIA personnel in Iraq. But sources tell me far larger CIA contracts were in the pipeline, until Wilkes was revealed to be involved in the Cunningham corruption case. "Wilkes was working on several other huge deals when the hammer fell," a source indicates. "There were several more opportunities on the board when the federal investigation came down on Wilkes. Opportunities worth much more than the $5M or $10 million/year deals Wilkes was used to. The FBI probably knows about these from the raids they conducted, but I wonder if they have shared that information with the CIA." The last point refers to the CIA Inspector General investigation of the CIA contracts Wilkes'-associated firms received, including, the probe will examine, any directed by Wilkes' best friend, Dusty Foggo, the executive director of the Agency.

And what were the forthcoming contracts for? According to a source, they were to create and run a secret plane network, for whatever needs the CIA has for secret fleets of planes. Presumably, that might include "extraordinary renditions," e.g. to fly terror suspects off the radar to locations for interrogation. "I Imagine that since their whole flying operation has been outed, it makes it tough to operate clandestine flights," the source explained. "I bet it would cost a bundle to set up a whole new operation that no one knew about ... How do they operate a secret fleet of aircraft now that everyone knows about the planes we have? If I were high up in the CIA, this would be a big priority for me, and I would need a solution outside the normal range of solutions." Enter trusted contractor Brent Wilkes and Archer Logistics, and perhaps a whole new front company to be invented for the purpose.

And who would Wilkes go to for help with such a venture? To a subcontractor? To some other sort of fixer adept at creating and registering front companies? At running below the radar operations that nevertheless require proper airplane registrations, etc. For the purposes of speculation, one might ponder, what kind of fixers might have been involved even in the discussions (since the contracts were still pending when the Cunningham case broke). Was alleged Cunningham co-conspirator #3 Thomas Theodore Kontogiannis involved? I don't know. But I wonder.

Here's a short list of companies controlled by Kontogiannis:

161 Hempstead Realty
Apple Homes Corp
Axxion Group LLC
Bayswater Ltd
Bravo
Brookville Plaza Management
Calvander
Coastal Capital Corp
Duocash PLC
Emerald Estates Ltd
Eurocon International LLC
First Equity Corporation
Genfinity Corp
Group Kappa
InterAmerican Mortgage Company
Kontogiannis Construction, Inc.
Kontogiannis Developers, Ltd
Moonlight Management
Olympicorp International
Olympic Corp
Olympic Equtiy Corp
Olympic Petroleum Industries, Inc
Onlinetelcard
PlayRadio
Rockaway Real Estate
SeaView Estates
Yonah Real Estate

As another source explained to me, Kontogiannis "has oodles of companies, and none of them appear to be in legitimate business, i.e. they operate legit only to cover for scams." He's one go-to guy for front companies. Whether he's done work as a fixer for US intelligence linked business is something one might ponder. He certainly seems to be protected.

Update: Readers have sent more Kontogiannis companies they have found:

Reader C says Coaster Capital Corp is now Clearlight Mortgage.

And JP says that "Kontogiannis has a construction company named Bond & Walsh located at 133 Brookville Blvd in Rosedale, Queens, NYC. One real estate site listed Jamaica rather than Rosedale as the town." More here.

Posted by Laura at March 6, 2006 10:59 PM