SUMMARY:
The American greed episode that I watched was called “In Harm’s Way”, which aired in July 2015. It involved a U.S military contractor named David H. Brooks who loots his company of $190 million dollars and goes on a wild spending sprees. The story started off discussing about Brooks childhood and how he was ridiculed due to his father having a crippling disease, so as he got older he was known to have a chip on his shoulder and he felt he had to validate himself to others. In 1986 Brooks and his brother started a stock brokerage business. David Brooks was a very smart man and was good with numbers and became a millionaire. In 1992 he was fined and barred from the securities business for 5 years due to inside trading. During this time Brooks buys and invests in a holding company which is a private business he named after himself called DHM and sets up the business in his home. Brooks hired a federal prosecutor name Douglas Burns to help manage the business. Burns worked for Brooks for a year realizing that the job was not for him and Brooks had more bills mounting up. Burns ended up quitting after questioning Brooks about the books of the company.
David Brooks later purchased a building centered on bankruptcy called Body Amour and renamed it Point Blank. This company sold a body guard called the interceptor that was developed to help protect soldiers during the war. Brooks hired Jim Magee as the president of the company. 82 million vests for the U.S. Marine Corps were made for the troops. As time went on Magee took a closer look into the books and investors report and realized the unit numbers of the inventory were wrong. He then confronted Brooks about the wrong numbers and the two argued which resulted in Magee quitting. In 2001 after September 11, the interceptor vests were in high demand. Brooks was in a rush to make the vests and the workers complained about the work environment and conditions which resulted in a strike that lasted 6...
