A story ran in March that caught my eye but didn’t seem to catch the full attention of the press. Federal officers from the U.S. Department of Commerce raided the offices of Law Enforcement Associates in Raleigh, charging the company with unlawfully exporting a sophisticated surveillance vehicle to Morocco.

The company, on whose board the former House majority leader Tony Rand once served as chairman, has been in trouble before. In 2005, founder John Carrington was charged with illegally exporting police equipment to China. He paid an $850,000 fine and agreed not to export anything for five years. Except Carrington couldn’t resist and got in trouble two years later for violating the ban again.

What’s up with this company? Is this another Blackwater in our own backyard? Are these sophisticated, Big Brother-ish tools being used against Middle Eastern democracy protesters? Was China using its “police equipment” to crush dissent? What’s the story here?