For mercenaries, fateful ambush

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Cote, four others, were ambushed in broad daylight

8 months after abduction in Iraq, security guards still missing

By Steve Fainaru - WASHINGTON POST
Updated: 08/06/07 7:42 AM

EDITOR’S NOTE: Former Amherst resident Jonathon Cote was one of five private security guards kidnapped while escorting a convoy in Iraq last November. This is the story of the ambush and a private security company that cut corners and bent the rules while operating in a war zone.

Second of two parts

BAGHDAD — The convoy was ambushed in broad daylight last Nov. 16, dozens of armed men swarming over 37 tractor-trailers stretching for more than a mile on southern Iraq’s main highway. The attackers seized four Americans and an Austrian employed by Crescent Security Group, a small private security firm. Then they fled.

None of the hostages, including former Amherst resident Jonathon M. Cote, has been found, more than eight months after one of the largest and most brazen kidnappings of Americans since the U.S.-led coalition invaded Iraq in March 2003.

Crescent is shuttered, like dozens of other companies that have come and gone in Iraq’s booming market for private security services. The firm leaves behind a trail of broken lives and a record of alleged misconduct. In March, the U.S. military barred Crescent from U.S. bases after it was found with weapons prohibited for private security companies, including rocket launchers and grenades, according to documents and interviews with former Crescent employees and U.S. officials.

An investigation by the Washington Post found that Crescent violated U.S. military regulations while being paid millions of dollars to support the U.S.- led mission in Iraq. The company routinely sacrificed safety to cut costs. On the day of the kidnappings, just seven Crescent guards protected the immense convoy as it drove through southern Iraq, a force that security experts described as inadequate to fend off a major attack.

Former senior managers with Crescent denied any wrongdoing and said the guards who were seized had been well-equipped and simply failed to thwart the kidnappers.