WASHINGTON — Government investigators smuggled bombmaking materials into federal buildings past the police agency charged with protecting those buildings and found numerous other gaps in security, according to a congressional report.
The Government Accountability Office said investigators carried bombmaking materials past security at 10 federal buildings.
Security at these buildings and a total of about 9,000 federal buildings around the country is provided by the Federal Protective Service, a target of the probe.
Once GAO investigators got the materials in the buildings, the report said, they constructed explosive devices and carried them around inside. For security reasons, the GAO report did not give the locations of the buildings.
The report was made available to The Associated Press in advance of a hearing scheduled today of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
“The findings of covert security tests conducted by GAO investigators are stunning and completely unacceptable. In post- 9/11 America, I cannot fathom how security breaches of this magnitude were allowed to occur,” said Maine Sen. Susan Collins, the top Republican on the committee.
The GAO found other problems with guard training and reported that in one check of security, investigators found a guard asleep on the job after taking the painkiller Percocet. In another, they found a guard failed to recognize or did not properly X-ray a box carrying handguns at the loading dock of a facility.
Gary Schenkel, director of the Federal Protective Service, said in prepared testimony that after he learned of the GAO findings he instructed regional directors to increase their inspections and report what actions they would take to address and correct problems.
