Or more accurately, he presumes. Recent signs point to a run for the Montana Governorship in 2012 by notable (and occasionally controversial) investigator and intelligence old-hand, Neil Livingstone. Best known from his stints as a founder of GlobalOptions and Executive Action, Livingstone appears to be looking to add "Governor" to his resume.

Labels: ExecutiveAction, GlobalOptions, Neil C. Livingstone

So a little bird tells me.

Haven't reviewed the filing yet, but apparently the case will be going bye-bye with no fault all around. Here's the background, if the story has slipped your mind.

-- MDT

Labels: Coca-Cola, GlobalOptions, Gulnora Karimova, Maqsudi, Roz Trading, Uzbekistan, Zeromax

And it has been two years...

Levinson disappeared in March 2007 on a trip to Iran's Kish islands. Levison's official reason for the trip was to scout locations on the for a Canadian documentary film. According to later statements from his family, Levinson was actually in Iran for an altogether different purpose - investigating cigarette smuggling on behalf of his security consulting firm. The State Department's official statement on the Levinson disappearance calls it a "business trip."

His wife, seven children and two grand children await his safe return.

Mr. Levinson was employed by the U.S. Department of Justice for 28 years, spending time with the FBI and DEA. After three decades of government service, Levinson hung out his own investigative shingle and in 2006 he joined SafirRosetti / GlobalOptions becoming the point man for their Florida office. Levinson at one point served as the managing directory of the Miami office of invesitgative firm, Decision Strategies and he was also famously involved in the investigation of the Paul Klebnikov murder.

One hopes for the best, but in this kind of situation who really knows. Levinson's family has set up a website to help keep attention on the case. You can find it here.

For more on how the Levinson case might find itself front and center in the Obama administration's renewed efforts at diplomacy with Iran check out this Miami Herald article from February.

-- MDT

Labels: Decision Strategies, GlobalOptions, Paul Klebnikov, Robert Levinson, SafirRosetti

ExecutiveAction is the, apparently troubled, risk management firm founded by Neil Livingstone, formerly of GlobalOptions. It is well known that Livingstone's parting from GlobalOptions was less than cordial and it would seem that acrimony has followed him to his new digs. Intelligence Online is reporting that multiple senior staff have bailed from Livingstone's new venture.

This defection comes at the same time some of the current prime movers at GlobalOptions, and have been named in an investigation of controversial Russian billionaire, Oleg Deripaska. Deripaska was apparently Livingstone contact initially, and is only one of the dodgy characters from that part of the world with which Livingstone has been known to associate himself.

In any case, click on though to the IO article for full details on the sitch at ExecutiveAction.

-- MDT

Labels: ExecutiveAction, GlobalOptions, Neil C. Livingstone, Oleg Deripaska

Those would be three things you most definitely do not want to see together in a sentence if you are risk consultancy, GlobalOptions. And yet these days it almost seems a given that in an article that involves an investigative firm and shady dealings in Russia, GlobalOptions is guaranteed at least a walk-on part...

In the complex case of Russian, billionaire and metal magnate, Oleg Deripaska, unfortunately, the role for GlobalOptions seems quite serious. 

Labels: Alexander Mirtchev, GlobalOptions, Oleg Deripaska, Thomas Ondeck

Rich Rosetti is hanging out a new shingle. The long-time fixture of the corporate investigative biz (18 years at Kroll, etc.) has announced Washington, DC offices for The Rosetti Group, his new venture.

Not specifically mentioned in Rosetti's announcement is the fact that both he and Joseph Rosetti recently (and at least from outside appearances - abruptly) jumped ship from their former firm, SafirRosetti only a month ago.

SafirRosetti, co-founded with partner Howard Safir in 2001, had been purchased by the risk consulting firm, GlobalOptions back in 2006. SafirRosetti remains under the GlobalOptions umbrella and the watchful eye of Howard Safir.

-- MDT

Labels: GlobalOptions, Howard Safir, Joe Rosetti, Rich Rosetti, SafirRosetti

Did the daughter of Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev use a U.S. investigative firm to pry details out of an $84 million Justice Department bribery probe targeting her father?

It certainly seems so. The New York Times reported today that Dariga Nazarbayeva hired investigative firm, GlobalOptions for just such a purpose.

In a 2003 report produced by GlobalOptions and cited by The Times, the firm stated that they "mined connections at the White House, State Department, Justice Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation to learn more about the inquiry."

It might comfort you to know (or it might not) that CIA Director James Woolsey and former FBI Directors William Webster and William Sessions have all been affiliated with GlobalOptions in recent years.

I hear that they're all doing quite well in private practice.

-- MDT

Labels: bribery, Dariga Nazarbayeva, GlobalOptions

We've written a few times in this space about the strange bedfellows one sometimes encounters with the current breed of international investigative and risk management firms. From time to time their clients appear to be, well, slightly more controversial than even the most reviled or disgraced corporation, hedge fund or ambulance chasing law firm.

Take for example the recent National Journal article, Lobbying & Law - Touting 'Terrorists (subscription - unfortunately - required) which highlights connections between risk management firm, GlobalOptions (who we already mentioned once this week) and the Iranian "MEK," a group the State Department calls a "foreign terrorist organization." Specifically, they describe the Mujahedin-e Khalq Organization as follows:

The MEK, a largely Iranian group, mixes Marxism, nationalism, and Islam. The MEK was formed in the 1960s and was expelled from Iran after the Islamic Revolution in 1979. Since the late 1980s, its primary support came from the former Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein. The MEK conducted anti-Western attacks prior to the Islamic Revolution. Since then, it has conducted terrorist attacks against the interests of the clerical regime in Iran and abroad.

Nice guys. Right? But in truth the MEK has been working hard to shake the terrorist mantle and has in pursuit of that goal, enlisted a few notable beltway personalities including former House Majority Leader Dick Armey and Raymond Tanter, a former senior staff member at the National Security Council during the Reagan administration.

This is where GlobalOptions comes in.

Along with DLA Piper the firm produced a report in 2006, with an introduction co-written by Armey and former GlobalOptions honcho Neil Livingstone. Livingstone has also been a member of the Iran Policy Committee, a group co-founded by the aforementioned Raymond Tanter, which also argues in favor of changing the diplomatic status of the MEK who, again, our State Department views as terrorists.

Quite the tangled web... Sometimes the enemy of your enemy is your friend. But sometimes they're really just bad dudes. Kudos to the National Journal - great article if you have the means to check it out.

-- MDT

Labels: DLA Piper, GlobalOptions, MEK, Neil C. Livingstone, Raymond Tanter

I must confess that I am not entirely sure what a workers' compensation third-party administrator really is but I do know that one such beast in Pennsylvania just inked a $3 million deal with investigative firm GlobalOptions.

-- MDT

Labels: GlobalOptions

Really interesting stuff here from Conde Nast Portfolio (great magazine, even better website) on the movement of government spooks into the private sector. This article is an absolute must read.

Included in the piece is big coverage of the recent shenanigans at Wal-Mart along with name-checks of spy-heavy investigative outfits like Diligence LLC, GlobalOptions, Trident Group, Kroll and Business Intelligence Advisors.

You'll see reference to many of the recent scandals that have been attached to these names (and covered in this space - click the tags below for past Daily Caveat coverage). You'll also get a bit of history on how spooks came to find their way into the private sector.

Again, highly, highly recommended reading...

Labels: BIA, CondeNast Portfolio, corporate espionage, Diligence LLC, GlobalOptions, Kroll, Trident Group

ExecutiveAction is the new shop from Neil Livingstone, founder of Global Options, an investigative firm he split from in 2006 in a very nasty and public manner. Mother Jones has the humerous/scary details on a recent ExecutiveAction press release concerning deadly spores.

-- MDT

Labels: ExecutiveAction, GlobalOptions, Neil C. Livingstone

Global Options, a DC-Based investigative firm, is facing charges that it created a number of libelous websites in an attempt to defame the reputation of the Maqsudi family, which owns New Jersey-based ROZ Trading.

Why would a self-advertised CIA whose advisory board includes such luminaries as James Woolsey and William Sessions commit such acts? According to counsel for the Maqsudis, the websites were created at the behest of Zeromax, GmbH, a Global Options client and are a part of a long running domestic feud.

Zeromax is purported to have extensive business ties to Gulnora Karimova, harvard grad, black belt, pop starlet (??) and daughter of daughter of Uzbekistan's hard-handed President, Islom Karimov. The Maqsudis alledge that the websites are being used as an attempt to punish Mansur Maqsudi who had the misfortune to have divorced Gulnora.

The charges against Global Options go beyond libel - so far as to say that the company's former CEO, Neil Livingstone actually passed on death threats to the Maqsudi family unless they dropped a pending lawsuit against Zeromax.

You can check out further details of the pending litigation and find out how the Coca-Cola company gets involved in all of this by checking out the press release from Crowell & Moring LLP.

-- MDT

Labels: Coca-Cola, GlobalOptions, Gulnora Karimova, Maqsudi, Roz Trading, Uzbekistan, Zeromax

You may have seen the recent page one Wall Street Journal article describing how DC powerbrokers are now using their contacts and influence to flog the interests of some decidedly dodgy characters from the former Soviet Union.

Buried in this can of worms is an interesting connection to a former executive of a DC-area investigative firm. One of the DC power brokers listed as a door-opener for the dubious is Neil C. Livingstone, security expert, founder and former chief executive of investigative firm, GlobalOptions (Livingstone departed GlobalOptions in January '07).

Livingstone is mentioned in the article as being a key individual who helped arrange high-powered counsel (former FBI Directory William Sessions) and broker a potential deal for Semyon Mogilevich, whereby the notorious Ukrainian organized crime figure might be able to avoid prosecution in exchange for offering helpful information to the U.S. government.

Such a deal has, so far, been rejected, given the pending 45 counts of racketeering and money laundering Mogilevich is facing in Philadelphia - not to mention the Justice Department's ongoing probe of billions of dollars worth of questionable oil and gas deals...

The ties between Livingstone and Mogilevich apparently go back several years. Records would seem to indicate that GlobalOptions, under Livingstone did some work for a Cyprus-based firm called Highrock Holdings, of which Mogilevich was a major shareholder. Exactly what kind of work is disputed, but it is known that GlobalOptions later filed suit in DC District Court over unpaid bills (the suit was abandoned, but not withdrawn when the bill was paid).

An intriguing thread to tease out of a very interesting story.

If you want to know what you government officials are up to you can check out the WSJ article here (with subscription) or via Eurasia.org.

Labels: Former Soviet Union, GlobalOptions, influence, lobbying, money laundering, Neil C. Livingstone, organized crime