... for this?
The Veterans Affairs Department learned about the theft of electronic data on 26.5 million veterans shortly after it occurred, on May 3, but waited two weeks before telling law enforcement agencies, officials said Tuesday.
The officials said investigators in the Justice Department and the Federal Bureau of Investigation were furious with the leaders of the veterans agency for initially trying to handle the loss of the data [possibly the largest data theft ever] s an internal problem through the agency's inspector general before coming forward.
Officials said the investigators in the Justice Department and F.B.I. had complained that the delay might have cost them clues to the whereabouts of the data, stored on computer disks that were stolen in a burglary on May 3 at the home of an agency employee in Maryland.
UPDATE 3:09 PM: This gets even better. VA Secretary Jim Nicholson "was not told about the missing data until the night of May 16, or 13 days after the discs containing the data were stolen in a burglary at the residence of a department employee who had taken them home without authorization... [T]he secretary called the Federal Bureau of Investigation once he learned of the theft."
UPDATE 4:40 PM: Axe has a killer piece for Military.com today on Iraq vets' struggle to adjust to post-war life.
