MMS ex-staffer admits failing to report gift

NEW ORLEANS - A former supervisor for a federal agency entangled in an ethics and sex scandal pleaded guilty Wednesday to failing to report that an oil industry contractor paid for a hunting trip he took.

Federal prosecutors said Donald Howard, 59, of Destrehan, accepted the trip from an unidentified contractor while working as the Gulf of Mexico regional supervisor of field operations for the Interior Department's Minerals Management Service.

The agency regulates oil and gas operations on leased federal property. Howard pleaded guilty to making a false statement to a federal agency and is scheduled to be sentenced by U.S. District Judge Jay Zainey on Feb. 3.

Prosecutors haven't named the offshore drilling company that paid for Howard's 2004 hunting trip to Falfurrias, Texas, which was worth an estimated $2,459. Howard didn't report the trip even though he was required to disclose any gifts or travel worth $285 or more, prosecutors said.

Howard's guilty plea is the third by a Minerals Management Service official since investigators released a report this year on a "culture of substance abuse and promiscuity" by the agency's workers.

However, Howard's lawyer, Rick Simmons, said he doesn't think the case against his client is a product of the broader investigation by the Interior Department's internal watchdog.

"This was over two years ago that they looked at this matter," he said.

A two-year probe by the Interior Department's inspector general found that employees at the agency's royalty collection office in Denver accepted gifts from energy companies, used cocaine and marijuana and had sexual relationships with company representatives doing government business.

Minerals Management Service spokeswoman Eileen Angelico said Howard was fired in January 2007, but she declined to comment on his guilty plea.

Howard faces up to five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. He is free on $5,000 bond.

In July, former Interior Department employee Jimmy Mayberry pleaded guilty to violating conflict of interest laws. Mayberry was accused of helping create a consulting position that he filled after retiring from the government.

Las Vegas resident Milton Dial, a former deputy associate director at a division of the Minerals Management Service, pleaded guilty in September to a related charge of violating conflict of interest laws.

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Associated Press writer Ken Ritter in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

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