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Pentagon has not told companies of employees' abuses

More than two months after a classified Army report found that two contract workers were implicated in the abuse of Iraqis at a prison outside Baghdad, the companies that employ them say that they have heard nothing from the Pentagon, and that they have not removed any employees from Iraq.

For one of the employees, the Army report recommended "termination of employment" and revocation of his security clearance. For the other, it urged an official reprimand and review of his security clearance.

But J.P. London, chief executive of CACI, one of the companies involved, said in an interview yesterday that "we have not received any information or direction from the client regarding our work in country -- no charges, no communications, no citations, no calls to appear at the Pentagon."

Ralph Williams, vice president for communications for Titan, the other company, also said Monday that the company has heard nothing, and that none of Titan's workers have been recalled.

Military spokesmen in Washington and Baghdad said Monday evening that they had no information on whether the workers were still on the job or why the report had not been conveyed to the companies.

In a statement issued Monday, CACI defended its employees, saying they are well-trained former military personnel.

The classified Army report asserted that at least one employee of CACI was among those "either directly or indirectly responsible for the abuses at Abu Ghraib," the Iraqi prison.

It is unclear whether the second employee implicated works for CACI or Titan, since the Army report mentions both companies. Neither company would comment.

CACI said in its statement that one of the men listed in the report "is not and never has been a CACI employee," but the statement did not name him.

Companies with employees in Iraq usually refuse to identify them, citing security concerns.

CACI International, a 41-year-old public company whose main business is information technology -- it manages the State Department's e-mail system, for example -- said it has opened its own investigation.

London, the CACI chief executive, said the military still had not provided the company with a copy of the military report, completed Feb. 26, that makes allegations about CACI's employees.

Two civilians were cited in the report. One of them, Steven Stephaniwicz, is described as a civilian interrogator, an employee of CACI assigned to the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade.

London said the company opened an intelligence service division in the late 1990s whose mission is "intelligence information collection, analysis, field support and human intelligence that could include these types of interviews." It remains a small part of the business, he added.

Joe Vafi, an analyst who follows the company for Jeffries & Co in San Francisco, said CACI "has hired a lot of former military, former intelligence."
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