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Remember the EPA bureaucrat who got caught receiving $900,000 in pay without working because he claimed he also was employed by the CIA? According to a report from the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, the man, former climate policy expert John Beale, “retired” when questions arose about his spotty attendance and expense records. Only he didn’t file his retirement paperwork and continued to draw an active-duty salary for some time after. His boss at the time in the EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation, now-EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, knew this for about seven months and did nothing to stop...

When President Obama announced an unprecedented effort by the EPA to strong-arm states into adopting cap-and-trade, he made the announcement not by focusing on the benefits of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, but rather on the so-called co-benefits that closing coal plants will have on particulate matter, which is already tightly regulated. These purported co-benefits are based on two secret studies that have never been publicly validated. Amazingly, the architect of this co-benefits strategy is a long-time EPA staffer named John Beale, now known as federal inmate number 33005-016 and locked up for fraud at Cumberland Federal Correctional Institution. For nearly...

During the “polar vortex,” some of us taunted frostbitten global warming alarmists who snapped back that isolated extreme weather events don’t indicate long-term trends. Good. Because if they can remember that during heat waves and storms, we can actually look at long-term trends. Really long. Geologically long. Back to when simple animals appeared in the “Cambrian explosion” about 542 million years ago. Google it and you’ll find a chart of global temperature and carbon dioxide in the air from which two things will jump out at you right away. First, atmospheric CO2 does not drive temperature. It hit 7000 ppm...

But Gina McCarthy tells GOP lawmakers she can't answer climate-change questions: 

“I just look at what the climate scientists tell me."

Scientists say the world’s climate is warming faster than feared because previous predictions were too “optimistic” and overestimated the cooling impact of clouds. As the planet marked its fourth hottest year on record, a study published in the journal Nature found increasing levels of carbon dioxide will lead to thinner ocean clouds and reduce their cooling impact, causing temperature rises of at least 5.6F (3C) over the course of the century. The team of scientists said the findings show some climate models have been too “optimistic” and previous estimates of a minimum temperature rise of only 2.7F (1.5C) could now...

Policies surrounding climate change are poised to heat up in 2014 as major aspects of President Obama's climate plan come to fruition. The Environmental Protection Agency is expected to announce historic final standards aimed at curbing carbon emissions from the nation's power plants in June, but not before lawmakers and industry groups give their two cents on the issue. Next year, Republicans are expected to continue the crusade against the administration's climate regulations, which they have dubbed the "war on coal." Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), who sits on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW), and Rep. Lamar Smith...

Former Durham, NC district attorney Mike Nifong was disbarred for withholding evidence from the defense and lying to the court in the trumped-up Duke lacrosse team rape case. Ex-Boston crime lab technician Annie Dookhan was prosecuted for faking test results and contaminating drug samples, to get accused dealers convicted. In both cases, charges against their victims were dismissed or are under review. So how should we handle federal officials who’ve become unethical researchers and prosecutors – determined to get convictions, basing their cases on esoteric circumstantial evidence, allowing tainted and fraudulent evidence, hiding exculpatory information, rewriting the law, and...

The EPA’s highest-paid employee and a leading expert on climate change deserves to go to prison for at least 30 months for lying to his bosses and saying he was a CIA spy working in Pakistan so he could avoid doing his real job, say federal prosecutors. John C. Beale, who pled guilty in September to bilking the government out of nearly $1 million in salary and other benefits over a decade, will be sentenced in a Washington, D.C., federal court on Wednesday. In a newly filed sentencing memo, prosecutors said that his “historic” lies are “offensive” to those who...

Gina McCarthy, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), asked scientists at a climate change conference on Thursday in Arlington, Va., to explain the science of climate change. She also said that the EPA looks at climate change as an opportunity to grow the economy and create jobs. […] Obama referenced climate change in his State of the Union address while talking about “cleaner energy.” “The shift to a cleaner energy economy won’t happen overnight, and it will require tough choices along the way,” Obama said. “But the debate is settled. Climate change is a fact. And when our children’s...

The EPA’s highest-paid employee and a leading expert on climate change deserves to go to prison for at least 30 months for lying to his bosses and saying he was a CIA spy working in Pakistan so he could avoid doing his real job, say federal prosecutors. Follow @NBCInvestigates John C. Beale, who pled guilty in September to bilking the government out of nearly $1 million in salary and other benefits over a decade, will be sentenced in a Washington, D.C., federal court on Wednesday. In a newly filed sentencing memo, prosecutors said that his lies were a "crime of...

The former high-ranking Environmental Protection Agency official who stole nearly $900,000 — by claiming he was doing work for the CIA away from the office and by faking his retirement while still drawing a paycheck — was sentenced Wednesday to 32 months in prison. “I own this, this is on me, and this is my responsibility. … I’m ashamed of [my] greed,” John Beale, a former senior policy adviser and 24-year veteran at the EPA, said at his sentencing hearing in Washington. Beale, 65, pleaded guilty in September, admitting that over the past decade he had collected $886,186 for work...

The EPA’s highest-paid employee and a leading expert on climate change was sentenced to 32 months in federal prison Wednesday for lying to his bosses and saying he was a CIA spy working in Pakistan so he could avoid doing his real job. John C. Beale’s crimes were “inexplicable” and “egregious," said Judge Ellen Huvelle in imposing the sentence in a Washington. D.C. federal court. Beale has also agreed to pay $1.3 million in restitution and forfeiture to the government. Beale said he was ashamed of his lies about working for the CIA. “Why did I do this? Greed –...

February 26, 2014 EPA Officials Obstructed Fraud Investigation Blocked probe of senior official who cost taxpayers nearly $900,000 CJ Ciaramella Several Environmental Protection Agency employees obstructed an investigation into the mismanagement that allowed a senior EPA official to bilk taxpayers for nearly $900,000, the EPA Inspector General said in a letter to Sen. David Vitter (R., La.) released Wednesday.EPA employees threatened Inspector General investigators, refused to cooperate, and handed out non-disclosure agreements to other employees to keep them from being interviewed, EPA Inspector General Arthur Elkins Jr. wrote in response to a request for information by Vitter on the case.“Over...

The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has released a transcript of former senior EPA official John Beale’s testimony. The Committee deposed Beale in connection with his recent fraud conviction. He was sentenced to prison for posing as a CIA agent, and defrauding the government of about $900,000. Beale told the Committee that under President Barack Obama, the Environmental Protection Agency is being used for a purpose far beyond protecting the environment.There were several phases of this project as we had outlined it. There’s an enormous boy of literature on the subject. Sometimes it’s referred to sustainability literature, sometimes it’s...

One wonders how President Barack Obama and Environmental Protection Agency officials expect the public to trust the agency when it cannot even police its own high-ranking executives. We refer, of course, to former EPA Deputy Assistant Administrator John C. Beale, who last week was sentenced to 32 months in prison for fraud. For years, Beale would be absent from his Washington office for long periods at a time. Upon returning, he told co-workers he had been on secret assignments for the CIA.

The former senior EPA adviser who stole $900,000 from taxpayers while posing as a CIA agent pleaded the Fifth on Tuesday morning — shortly before House members expressed outrage upon learning that he’s still due to get his government pension. John C. Beale invoked his right not to incriminate himself when facing questioning from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, just four days after he pleaded guilty to charges that could bring him three years in prison.“Mr. Beale, do you have a statement?” panel Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) asked during the hearing. “Thank you, Mr. Chairman. No I do...