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Astronauts

The Astronaut Who Left NASA Over Fake Taxi Receipts Is …

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
May 18, 2017
Filed under , ,
The Astronaut Who Left NASA Over Fake Taxi Receipts Is …

Which Astronaut Recently Got Fired From NASA for $1,600 in Fake Taxi Receipts?, Gizmodo
“Last December, an astronaut with NASA was fired for submitting over $1,600 in fake reimbursements for taxis they didn’t take. And strangely enough, we don’t know who it is. … In the end, the NASA OIG office suggested something that has been redacted (we’re going to guess termination, but who knows?) and the astronaut ultimately resigned at some point in December 2016. Curiously, the exact date of resignation has also been redacted.”
Keith’s note: (sigh) Gizmodo can’t make up their mind. “Fired”, “Termination”, “Resigned”? Pick one. Oh wait – the OIG says that the astronaut “resigned”. While the end result is more or less the same (the astronaut no longer works at NASA) resigning is not the same as being “fired” or “terminated”. People get caught at NASA doing lots of things and they often keep their jobs.
As to who the astronaut is, well … check out this press release which refers to an astronaut who retired in December 2016: “Astronaut Cady Coleman Leaves NASA“. My sources tell me that Cady Coleman is indeed the astronaut mentioned by the OIG. This was not exactly a secret at NASA HQ over the past few months. I was not going to say anything – until I read the FOIA response that Gizmodo got. I’m sort of at a loss for words. Think of the millions of people who’d love to be a NASA astronaut – and then this is how one of them throws away that job.
Oh yes: I can guarantee you that the time that the OIG spent on this investigation in terms of their own staff’s salaries was a lot more than $1,600. Just sayin’

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

50 responses to “The Astronaut Who Left NASA Over Fake Taxi Receipts Is …”

  1. TheBrett says:
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    Seriously. Why would you throw away your astronaut career over $1600 of taxi rides?

    Then again, they let her retire, so maybe it’s a wash.

    • kcowing says:
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      I can guarantee you that the time that the OIG spent in terms of their own staff’s salaries was a lot more than $1,600. Just sayin’

      • Tim Blaxland says:
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        True enough. The OIG cost is potentially justified by the savings/prevention of future fraud. These things have a tendency to grow when left unchecked – unfortunately I’ve been in a position to observe it first hand.

      • ToSeek says:
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        If I’ve learned anything after thirty years of working with the government, it’s that they’ll spend $10,000 to make sure they don’t cheated out of $5,000.

        • fcrary says:
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          Well, yes. The goal isn’t to save money. It’s to make sure they know exactly how the money was spent. Knowing exactly where every penny of $10,000 was spent is better than spending $5000 without being able to account for it.

          • Daniel Woodard says:
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            I am sometimes astounded at the number of accounting and contract management manhours per actual task manhour in government contracting. The SAA strategy was revolutionary in that regard. If only they don’t decide that a return to traditional contracting is needed to assure safety or efficiency.

        • Michael Spencer says:
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          This is correct behavior for the government.

          It’s easy to measure outcomes with convenient and fungible dollars. It’s no secret that insurance companies make this calculation all the time.

          But dollars are a distraction. Rather than contributing to a decision, they become the sole arbiter. We have let that happen so universally nowadays that we constantly hear about ‘closing the business case,’ sometimes from folks with no clue about business but who have unqualified faith in the correctness of business principles being used to make decisions. This is wrong.

          It’s also easy, and wrong, to generalize from this single example. The point isn’t solely to save money.

  2. fcrary says:
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    Well, that doesn’t sound like something you’d want on you resume. But the story does say, “The astronaut was actually getting rides from friends and yet still filing to get reimbursed for travel expenses.” That makes it hard for me to see this as theft. She could have called a cab instead of a friend, and NASA would have been out the $1600 for perfectly legitimate reasons. I just hope this doesn’t produce a fad for everyone-must-have-receipts-for-everything accounting. That ends up costing more paperwork than it saves from this sort of thing.

  3. SouthwestExGOP says:
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    Even very smart people get over stressed, etc and make mistakes. Lisa Nowak is a good example; the amount of money is trivial.

  4. Johnhouboltsmyspiritanimal says:
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    $1600 in fake taxi claims forced retirement but billions in cost over runs, schedule slips for SLS, JWST, Orion and other programs over the years a not one head was rolled. Good to see the OIG is going after the harden criminals wasting tax payers dollars. /S

  5. Donald Barker says:
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    I’m very saddened by this for many reasons including that I had worked with her and that I have been trying to get that job now for 25 years with diminishing success and extremely, extremely high experience/credentials. When I first started working at JSC, they could have given me a cot to sleep on and food and I would have taken the job in a heart beat; probably still would. So Sad………….

  6. fcrary says:
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    Well, this might disappoint you, but let’s compare this to a fairly standard practice for government contractors traveling on business. We get a fixed daily reimbursement for meals and miscellaneous expenses, $64 for most cities in the US. Some institutions require receipts and reimburse up to $64 (or whatever), but many just make it $64 (to save the administrative costs of going over the receipts for every person-day.) If someone wants to, he could eat at McDonald’s and pocket about $50 per day on business travel. Of course, if decided to eat at fancy restaurants and spent more than the per diem, the difference would come out of his own pocket.

    Travel, including taxi fare, is accounted for differently. So this case is a legal issue. (As well as a pretty stupid thing for someone to do.) But since people are allowed to save money on meals and keep the savings, I can’t see doing the same thing for rides to the airport as a big, ethical transgression. Don’t get me wrong, it is illegal, since transportation cost aren’t accounted for that way. But I see it as crime on par with driving five miles per hour over the speed limit, not on par with robbing a bank.

    • Jeff2Space says:
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      So your rationalization is everyone cheats? No, not everyone cheats. I work with and know a lot of really honest engineers. Rule followers to the bitter end.

      • fcrary says:
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        No, I’m not rationalizing anything or implying anything about honesty. When it comes to the per diem for meals, I have no way of not getting it. There is no place on my institution’s reimbursement form to ask for less. They just look at the city, and deposit that many dollars per day in my bank account. A friend at the University of Michigan once specifically asked his administrative people if he could request less, and was told no. They didn’t want the administrative costs associated with reimbursing anything but the full US government-specified per diem. So, wether or not we like it, we get some extra money if we don’t spend enough on meals while traveling.

        Logically and ethically, it would make sense to treat transportation costs in the same way. Or, at least, it would be more consistent. That would just be a flat reimbursement for getting yourself to and from the airport regardless of how you did it. Of course, that isn’t how the system works, and claiming taxi expenses when you actually got a ride from a friend is illegal. Forging the receipts is worse (in my opinion.) But (except for the forgery) a reasonable argument could be made, to the effect that is no worse that what the system _requires_ people to do when it comes to meals.

        • Steve Pemberton says:
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          I really don’t see a comparison. In your example no fraud is occurring, both the employee and the institution are fully aware that the expense does not have to match the reimbursement. But for all other reimbursements which are based on actual expense, submitting anything other than the actual expense is outright fraud, regardless of how they might rationalize that they could have spent more but didn’t.

          A similar example in the private sector is moving expenses. My company reimburses me for actual expenses for moving truck, airfare, meals, rental car, etc. But they also give a certain amount for miscellaneous expenses, which they don’t expect or even want me to account for. So if I want to spend the miscellaneous money on a new TV no fraud is occurring. But for the other expenses, if I stay in Motel 6 but falsify that I stayed at Marriott, that is fraud, and I can’t justify it by saying well I could have stayed at Marriott and they would have paid for it.

          “I see it as crime on par with driving five miles per hour over the speed limit, not on par with robbing a bank.”

          I agree only on the second half of that statement, I also don’t see it on par with robbing a bank. I see it on par with shoplifting $1,600 worth of merchandise from a store.

          • fcrary says:
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            I guess your shoplifting analogy is better than my speeding one. She did falsely report expenses, and forging receipt isn’t exactly what I’d call ethical. I was trying to say that, under a different accounting system, it would not have been an offense at all. And that such a different system might actually be more consistent with the existing system for other expenses.

          • Steve Pemberton says:
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            “under a different accounting system, it would not have been an offense at all.”

            Agreed, and I’m pretty sure that is the rationalization and why someone who would never think of shoplifting doesn’t see this as a big deal.

            I guess since we are in an ethics discussion I suppose an example that probably hits closer to home is sick days. Although I don’t do it, I know it is quite common to have a wink, wink attitude about calling in sick when it’s nice golf weather, etc. I don’t begrudge anyone, I realize it is so common that probably no one thinks of it as fraud, and just assumes that sick days are just another type of vacation. Recently at my company we hired someone, we have an online attendance system where we self-report our days off, it’s essentially an honor system unless your boss is paying attention. In addition to vacation and sick days we get three personal days i.e. “floating holidays”. This new employee was telling me he couldn’t figure out how to enter his recent two days off for an out of town trip as floating holidays, so he entered them as sick days. He was completely nonplussed about it like this was completely normal. I wanted to suggest that he could have entered them as vacation days but I decided I will let him have his conscious and I’ll have mine.

          • Daniel Woodard says:
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            This is cost plus accounting taken to the absurd. It costs far more than it saves, in fact it saves nothing because of the massive accounting overhead and the elimination of any incentive for efficiency. The robbery is ocurring when the management decision is made to apply such a level of micromanagement.

  7. Odyssey2020 says:
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    This happens a lot more than people might think. It seems to me that after awhile some of these higher ranking vets that have been around a long time think everything is entitled to them. I remember one long term vet getting escorted out of his office due to falsifying his travel voucher. He definitely didn’t need the money but he did it anyway.

    Plus, the taxi scam is pretty easy to pull off but don’t get carried away with it..not $1,600 worth!!!

  8. fcrary says:
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    By the way, why did they even bother redacting her name? I guess it must have been due to some legal technicality. As Keith proved, a little investigation by a journalist would fill in the blanks. It seems a bit pointless to withhold information which is easy for people to figure out. After all, how many astronauts resigned last December?

    • kcowing says:
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      There are legal reasons.

      • fcrary says:
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        That’s basically what I expected. But I think it makes my point. At some level, the legal requirements prevent abuse and inefficiency. But, when taken too far, they can simply cost too much to justify those savings. Beyond that point, they simply become parasitic costs.

  9. Tally-ho says:
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    On a positive note at least she didn’t drive cross country in a space diaper to kidnap her ex-boyfriend’s girlfriend.

    • TerryG says:
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      Wasn’t going to mention it but yes, this is small beer compared to the black eye delivered to the Astronaut Corps by Lisa M Nowak.

    • dpalmer002 says:
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      No one drove access country wearing a space diaper. She had toddler size diapers for her kids left in the car from the Rita evacuation. The police mentioned diapers in the car, and as always, the press came to their own conclusions. A few of them were responsible enough to make the correction. If the press gave NASA that much coverage for everything they do right, funding for further space endeavors wouldn’t be a problem.

      • kcowing says:
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        Exactly. People do not check their facts.

      • Oscar_Femur says:
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        The detective’s statement says she told him she wore them. “Mrs. Nowak said that she did not want to stop and use the restroom, so, she used the diapers to collect her urine.” The lawyer says she did not.

        Regardless of the truth, if I ever get in trouble, I’m going to try and hire that lawyer.

  10. Todd Martin says:
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    Regardless of the minor circumstances regarding Ms. Coleman’s departure from NASA, I am proud and thankful for her service.

    • Odyssey2020 says:
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      Her transgressions may seem minor but in the military officer and NASA Astronaut corps they are considered shameful and career ending.

      • billinpasadena says:
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        Many she encounters now won’t know anything about this, but a damn fine resume is permanently tarnished. I knew a manager at a NASA center fired for falsifying travel reports. Pretty stupid, as he must have been making at least $150k and had a new child. He turned up later working for a contractor, who must not have asked if he was eligible for rehire.

        • Daniel Woodard says:
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          I think this is all pretty silly. It’s one thing to create expense out of thin air. But an organization that penalizes employees for saving money compared to what they were expected to spend anyway is going to waste money in the long run.

          • fcrary says:
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            Not exactly. This is about saving money and then personally pocketing the savings, rather than letting the company (or agency) keep them. Penalizing that may remove the incentive to save. Or it might not: if I can save money charged to one of my grants, then I can use it for something else. But if the amount charged to contracts and grants is the same (i.e. if the savings aren’t passed on) then the company isn’t any better off.

          • Daniel Woodard says:
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            You can spend grant money on something it wasn’t awarded for? I’m impressed. Seriously. What happens if you save money on a project and want to carry it over into the next fiscal year? What about maintaining your planned “burn rate”? Not being cynical, just want to figure out how its done.

          • fcrary says:
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            No, I can only spend grant money on things relevant to the planned work. But I do have some flexibility, and I am careful about how I write statements of work.

            For example, the statement of work might say we will present results at two conferences. If I can save some money on travel expenses, I can use that portion of my funding to bring along a student to one or both of those conferences, and have him make an additional, relevant presentation.

  11. Bad Horse says:
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    It could have been handled differently. Much worse gets ignored. All depends on who you are or what they want.
    I would bet she was asked for or to do something and said no. NASA has major problems with corruption (far, far worse than what she did).

    • Michael Spencer says:
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      Your statement (“major problems with corruption”) makes me curious because I sometimes here others making similar statements about various agencies.

      What is ‘corruption’, and what rises to the level of ‘major corruption’? If not an actual example perhaps a hypothetical?

      • Bad Horse says:
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        well some good examples:
        A NASA SES @ MSFC who ran a taxpayer funded brothel (hired contractors specifically for him and other managers to use for sex – no joke, no exaggeration). The GS-15 who wrote a contractors proposal for them while employed by NASA (and it was a proposal for the work she managed). Flight software testing that was faked and when confronted, the NASA manager said “so?”. A NASA emp who sold computers to the contractor that supported her. And more times than I can count, NASA emp blackballing or forcing contractors to hire people they have a personal relationship with.

    • Odyssey2020 says:
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      It’s very possible a jealous or vindictive person who knew of her activities turned her in.

      • Daniel Woodard says:
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        The report suggests that is the case. An “anonymous person” submitted a complaint to the OIG alleging that she had submitted questionable receipts in support of travel reimbursements. But why go to OIG anonymously? Why not notify management directly? Was there an ulterior motive here? Is the IG permitting itself to be used as a tool for personal vendetta? I am skeptical that the person making the accusation was motivated primarily by concern for our tax dollars.

        • Odyssey2020 says:
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          We’ll probably never know the full story..one thing’s for sure the astronauts are held to an extremely high standard. There is absolutely no reason for them to lie for an extra $1,600 bucks and if they get caught somebody else is going to get their coveted job.

        • fcrary says:
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          Or it could be someone who was afraid filing a complaint would get people mad at him (including, perhaps, his boss) and didn’t want to deal with that. There are protections for whistle blowers, but they aren’t perfect. If the complaint hadn’t been filled anonymously, he could easily have had _his_ expense reports looked over in microscopic detail for the rest of his career. The bad side of allowing anonymous reporting is allowing abusive or vendictive complaints. But the good side is making people feel safer reporting valid complaints.

          • Daniel Woodard says:
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            The report says she got rides from friends and believed she was entitled to the milage but was unable to get it without the recipts. It doesn’t say whether she kept the money or paid someone to provide the transportation. The government would have been happy with her spending the money on cab fare, so it’s hard to claim their goal was saving money, and they kept the actual firing quiet, so it apparently wasn’t an attempt to get others to toe the line.

            If she was a valuable employee, a supervisor could have spoken to her privately and cautioned her not to do it again. The savings in keeping an employee with years of training and experience would have been many times the amount at issue. The supervisor would have no obligation to tell her who reported the concern, and without a career ending legal attack it seems unlikely she would have initiated some sort of lifelong vendetta. OTOH if management was just looking for a reason to RIF her, then its another story. But either way, I doubt we have the full story.

  12. Ray Gunn says:
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    Sadly, if she truly were driven to or from the airport by a friend, I believe she would have been legally entitled to reimbursement for mileage plus parking and tolls (which hopefully she would have used to compensate her friend). However, if instead she carpooled with a colleague who could have claimed the mileage expense, then she could not have also done so.

    • space1999 says:
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      I don’t recall the exact figure, but under a certain amount, you don’t need to provide a receipt, maybe $75. Doesn’t make sense… wonder if she was pocketing the money or giving it to the friends who gave her a lift. If the latter, then maybe less of an issue morally, but still not kosher.

      • Odyssey2020 says:
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        She probably put that $1600 as deep in her own pockets as she possibly could.

  13. Mark Thompson says:
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    In the OIG’s defense, you don’t know that there was only $1600 in fraud until after the investigation. Not before. Thats why you do an investigation. There is also a strong deterrent effect that will save much more. How many other NASA employees are now going to play games with their expenses.

    • Michael Spencer says:
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      You do an investigation because some things are ‘right’ and some things are ‘wrong’.

  14. Mark Thompson says:
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    She was also getting rides to the ISS by her Russian friends. I hope she didn’t submit expenses for those trips too.

  15. Daniel Woodard says:
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  16. Kevin Hoover says:
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    And on top of all her other accomplishments, she did that cool flute duet with Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull. What a shame, throwing away such an illustrious career for relative pennies.