The Regents have made a complete reversal over the UC Labs fraud/theft fiasco. The fired auditors have been rehired as Consultants 'under extreme pressure from Congress,' the appeasing report that declared most items accounted for has been 'tossed out the window,' and it looks like a lot of senior administrators are going to get fired for instituting coverups.

We also get a better look at how such fraud could've occurred.

First, under the current system, the university conducts audits only for items that cost $5,000 or more, unless the item is "sensitive," such as a computer. Walp and Doran said the $5,000 threshold allowed employees to improperly order and steal less expensive items almost with impunity.

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Second, Los Alamos only maintains an inventory on items whose purchase price is $5,000 or more, again unless it is a "sensitive" item, such as a computer or electronic organizer. Those items are tracked with computer bar codes attached to the property.

But only a fraction of the items at the northern New Mexico lab that were supposed to carry the bar codes did, according to the university's December audit. According to that audit, the investigators found in one random check that only 31 of 59 items of valuable lab property that were supposed to carry bar codes actually did. Without the codes, it is not clear if the items would show up on inventory lists or be traceable without extraordinary, time- consuming manual audits.

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