No Testimony without Immunity, Man

House oversight committee Chair Henry Waxman (D-CA) wants the twenty-something senior executives of AEY, Inc. to appear for a Congressional hearing. You know, just to hang out and chat about how they managed to bag a $300 million contract to provide munitions to Afghan forces, and then allegedly lied about where they were coming from.

But they’re not going to come easy, The New York Times reports:

Marc D. Seitles, the lawyer who represents David M. Packouz, the licensed massage therapist who is AEY’s former vice president, said he had sent a letter to Congress saying Mr. Packouz would speak publicly only if he was granted immunity from prosecution.

Mr. Packouz, 25, left AEY last spring and had no contact with the company since, Mr. Seitles said. Without immunity, he said, “I cannot allow my client to testify in this matter, and if he is subpoenaed he will invoke the Fifth Amendment.”

AEY and particularly its president Efraim Diveroli do have a lot to worry about. Federal investigators are digging to see if Diveroli committed a crime by promising in a contract to deliver Hungarian ammo, when he was in fact delivering forty year-old Chinese ammo (itself prohibited). And Government Executive reports today that AEY might have also misrepresented itself as a disadvantaged business, allowing it to pick up much more business.

It seems highly unlikely that Congress would even consider immunity for either Diveroli or Packouz, so either Waxman’s planned hearing later this month will be deferred, or the two will spend a lot of time respectfully pleading the Fifth.