This isn’t a web of scandal as much as it is a tangled, matted knot that becomes even more like a nasty wet hairball clogging your shower drain with every update.

Let’s start from the top.

Diane Rubens and Kimberly Graves are–ahem, were–two regional directors for the Department of Veterans Affairs. Together, they scammed the entire VA out of $400,000 by manipulating the agency’s hiring and relocation system. Basically, they wanted to be paid more to do less without going through the agency’s usual hiring channels. When this was discovered by the Office of the Inspector General, they were investigated but not fired.

After they were caught, the duo repeatedly pleaded the Fifth in front of Congress in order to avoid testifying that they indeed stole all that money. They were demoted but not fired.

Most recently, the VA has concluded that it won’t attempt to take back any of the money that Rubens and Graves so adeptly embezzled. The VA’s top attorney actually admitted to Rep. Jeff Miller, Chairmen of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, that the agency lacks the legal authority to reclaim the money stolen from it.

For anyone keeping score, this means that Rubens and Graves have 1) high-paying jobs in the VA, 2) less responsibilities due to their demotion and 3) a stockpile of $400,000 the VA won’t touch. They’ve gotten exactly what they wanted.

As the man who spearheaded the investigation, Rep. Miller expressed his outrage in an official letter to VA Secretary Bob McDonald.

“How can it be that the law prohibits recouping benefits paid to, or on behalf of, employees who only received those benefits because they abused their positions of authority?” Miller asked in his letter. “To put it mildly, VA’s decision defies common sense.”

Miller also asked why the VA could be so diligent about recovering small amounts of money from veterans and their families when it can’t apply the same scrutiny to its own employees.

“VA aggressively pursues the recoupment of overpayment of benefits made to veterans, survivors and other beneficiaries even when the overpayments are due to VA’s own error,” Miller wrote. “I am sure you appreciate the lunacy of a policy that is stricter on veteran beneficiaries of earned benefits as compared to corrupt government employees who enrich themselves at taxpayer expense. It must not stand.”