CNN REPORTS: KBR FAILS TO GROUND ELECTRICAL CORD AND GREEN BERET IS ELECTROCUTED IN IRAQ SHOWER

When Vice President Dick Cheney was head of Halliburton one of the companies biggest subsidaries was KBR, Kellogg, Brown and Root, who has million dollar contracts to provide systems and services for American troops in Iraq.

KBR installed a shower at an Iraq Army base and a Green Beret was electrocuted when it was found KBR failed to ground the electricity leading to the shower.

Green Beret electrocuted in shower on Iraq base

Story Highlights
At least 12 U.S. troops have been electrocuted in Iraq from wiring problems
Ryan Maseth, 24, died January 2 while taking a shower on base
"I truly couldn't believe he would be electrocuted," his mom says
Defense Department inspector general, Congress launch investigation

By Abbie Boudreau and Scott BronsteinCNN Special Investigations Unit

http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/05/28/soldier.electrocutions/index.html

PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (CNN) -- A highly decorated Green Beret, Staff Sgt. Ryan Maseth died a painful death in Iraq this year. He died not on the battlefield. He died in what should have been one of the safest spots in Iraq: on a U.S. base, in his bathroom.

The water pump was not properly grounded, and when he turned on the shower, a jolt of electricity shot through his body and electrocuted him January 2.

The next day, Cheryl Harris was informed of his death. A mother of three sons serving in Iraq, she had feared such news might come one day.

"I did ask exactly, 'How did Ryan die? What happened to him?' And he had told me that Ryan was electrocuted," she said.

Her reaction was disbelief. "I truly couldn't believe he would be electrocuted ... in the shower," she said.

Maseth, 24, was not the first. At least 12 U.S. troops have been electrocuted in Iraq since the start of the war in 2003, according to military and government officials. Watch mom describe horror, heartbreak over son's electrocution »

In fact, the Army issued a bulletin in 2004 warning that electrocution was "growing at an alarming rate." It said five soldiers died that year by electrocution, with improper grounding the likely culprit in each case.

The Army bulletin detailed one soldier's death in a shower -- eerily similar to Maseth's case -- that said he was found "lying on a shower room floor with burn marks on his body."
Maseth's mother says the Army was not immediately forthcoming with details about her son's death.

At one point, she says, the Army told her he had a small appliance with him in the shower on his base, a former palace complex near the Baghdad airport.

"It just created so much doubt, and I know Ryan, I know Ryan, I know how he was trained, I know that he would not have been in a shower with a small appliance and electrocuted himself," she said. Watch "I can't make sense around Ryan's death" »

The Army refused to answer CNN's questions about the case, citing pending litigation by Maseth's family.

Maseth's mother says she pressed the military for answers, eventually uncovering more details about her son's electrocution. The surging current left burn marks across his body, even singeing his hair. Army reports show that he probably suffered a long, painful death.

Fellow soldiers had to break down the door to help, said Patrick Cavanaugh, an attorney for Maseth's parents.

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