Former NASA Official Guilty of Ethics Charge

Stadd, who worked on George W. Bush's 2000 campaign, was NASA's chief of staff from 2001 through 2003. He left to become a private consultant but returned to NASA in April 2005 for several months as a "special government employee" to help the transition of new administrator Michael Griffin.

It was during this time that federal prosecutors say he steered federal funds to a consulting client, Mississippi State University's GeoResources Institute, which has been renamed Geosystems Research Institute.