Supplier delivered bad steel to Navy for subs, say court documents

The Navy's top supplier of steel to build submarines gave the service inferior metal for years, prompting a nearly $10.9 million settlement, the Justice Department said in court filings released on Monday.

Bradken Inc., based in Kansas City, Mo., paid the settlement to resolve allegations that the company “produced and sold substandard steel components for installation on U.S. Navy vessels” after a Bradken employee “knowingly falsified test results to conceal the fact that the components did not meet the Navy’s specifications,” according to a department statement.

“When government contractors supply our armed forces with equipment that fails to meet performance standards, they not only cheat taxpayers, they also potentially put our service members at risk,” Jody Hunt, the assistant attorney general for the department’s civil division branch, said in the statement. “Today’s settlement demonstrates our commitment to ensuring the military receives products that enable it to perform its critical mission.”