Former top NASA official charged with steering $600K contract to Mississippi State University

Ex-top NASA official charged in Mississippi

JACKSON, Miss. — A former high-ranking NASA official pleaded not guilty Monday to nine federal charges accusing him of steering a $600,000 contract to Mississippi State University, a client of his consulting firm.

Courtney A. Stadd had already been convicted of steering a different contract for almost $10 million to the university. Stadd was sentenced in November to three years probation.

Stadd, 55, was NASA’s chief of staff and White House liaison from 2001 to 2003.

U.S. Attorney Don Burkhalter said Monday that Stadd faces up to 55 years in prison if convicted of the nine new charges, which include conspiracy, false statements, false claims, obstructing a grand jury and fraud.

Stadd’s attorney did not immediately respond to a message.

The contract was for a remote sensing study awarded by NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Hancock County, Miss.

Prosecutors said in a news release that Stadd began conspiring with NASA’s deputy chief engineer in 2004 to direct the $600,000 to Mississippi State University, which then subcontracted $450,000 to Stadd’s consulting business, Capitol Solutions.

The indictment also accuses Stadd of submitting inflated invoices for work he claimed to have done for the university, and of altering documents the government sought in January 2006.

A Mississippi State University spokeswoman did not immediately respond to an e-mail seeking comment.

The 16-page indictment, made public Monday, mainly deals with the Mississippi State University contract, but it also mentioned another one for $300,000 that went to the University of Maryland. Court records said $250,000 of that money went to a business in which Stadd was a member of the board and consultant.

“Without timely detection and prosecution of fraudulent contractors, new opportunities for space exploration and discovery at NASA would be limited, not by the abilities of NASA’s personnel but by greedy individuals diverting already limited funds from the agency’s intended use,” Burkhalter said.

Trial is scheduled for March 1.

Stadd started his consulting firm after leaving NASA in 2003, but he returned to the agency for a few months in 2005. That’s when he allegedly steered the nearly $10 million in contracts to the university in the previous case.

The judge in that case, U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer in Washington D.C., gave Stadd probation after saying it was a “close call” in figuring out if he acted corruptly or misunderstood ethics laws.