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FBI objects to the Constitution (CO)
Josey1
Member Posts: 9,598 ✭✭
FBI objects to the Constitution
When the jury in the Judi Bari trial requested copies of the First and Fourth Amendments this week, the FBI showed its true stripes by objecting. The jury asked for copies of the amendments to the U.S. Constitution to consider during deliberation, but Department of Justice council attorney Joseph Sher and City of Oakland attorney Marie Bee asked the judge not to grant their request.
The judge overruled the motion to oppose and read those amendments to the jury, but did not give the jury an actual copy of those amendments for them to return to the deliberation room.
Why would the FBI, a federal agency governed by the Constitution and its amendments, object to the jury having access to the law of the land? Perhaps because the FBI so often violates the Constitution.
"Their agents obviously haven't read the Constitution, so why would they want anyone else looking at it?" said Darryl Cherney, co-plaintiff in the civil rights lawsuit, now in its sixth week.
Four FBI agents and three Oakland police officers are on trial for allegedly denying equal protection under the law to Bari and Cherney, who were nearly killed when a bomb exploded in Bari's car. The FBI named the two as the primary suspects in the case, failing to follow up on leads and death threats Bari had received prior to the bombing. The lawsuit also alleges the FBI and police used the bombing to begin a smear campaign against Bari and Cherney, characterizing them as terrorists. The two were organizing for Redwood Summer at the time of the bombing.
White folks baffled
A bunch of white folks in Eaton, Colo., are confused. Why are American Indians upset? Just because Eaton High School calls its teams the Fightin' Reds and uses a squat, shovel-nosed cartoon depiction of an Indian as its mascot doesn't mean them Indians need to get upset. Or does it?
About 300 American Indians and their supporters marched through Eaton this week to protest the high school's use of a term and an image they believe is racist and insulting. "Red," short for "redskin," is held by most American Indians in much the same light as black Americans view the word "*."
But the white folks, mostly farmers, are having none of that.
"It's a tough little warrior that we're very proud of," said one local. "None of us feels like it's a negative portrayal."
Of course, none of them are Indian either, a fact pointed out by protesters, who say it should not be up to whites to decide what constitutes an honor to Indian people.
Protesters, including members of the American Indian Movement, have vowed to repeat their march through Eaton if the town doesn't change the name. It's a good bet they mean what they say. Perhaps it's time for Eaton to begin considering alternatives.
How about adding a few letters and calling themselves the Fightin' Rednecks? Or Fightin' Chinks? Or Fightin' *? Or Fightin' Crackers? Fightin' Krauts? Fightin' Wetbacks? Fightin' Wops? Fightin' Coolies?
If Eaton residents find any of those suggested names offensive, they've taken their first step toward understanding what all the fuss is about.
Bush campaigning again
George W. is already hard at working on his re-election campaign. In response to former President Jimmy Carter's ground-breaking visit to Cuba last week, Bush went on the campaign trail in Florida to let Cuban Americans know that he does not plan on lifting sanctions against the island nation any time soon. Carter and a host of humanitarian groups had urged Bush to drop the 40-year-old sanctions, which have caused great hardship for Cuban people.
While Bush was probably hoping to come off looking tough on communism, the politics behind his speeches and stop in Miami are transparent. It was Cuban voters that carried Bush to a narrow victory in Florida, the state that decided the 2000 election. Bush's brother Jeb, Florida's governor, is facing re-election this year and is also depending on the Cuban vote, which typically runs conservative.
So sorry to the people of Cuba. Maybe in a non-election year.
Fast track to hell
A bill before the U.S. Senate is so far-reaching that it could impact the lives of every American. The bill would cede to the U.S. president the ability to negotiate trade agreements, or fast track authority.
"In order for me to be effective on trade, I need trade promotion authority," President Bush told reporters. "I need the ability to speak with a single voice for our country."
Labor groups oppose fast track authority because it will almost assuredly send U.S. jobs overseas. Human-rights groups oppose it because it will erode workers' rights at home and promote the abuse of children as virtual slave labor abroad. Environmental groups oppose it because it will allow U.S. companies to evade environmental laws by moving operations to countries without laws.
Yeah, yeah. That's all terrible. But here's what's scarier: Bush thinking he's speaking on behalf of all Americans "in a single voice." A forked tongue is more like it.
Respond: letters@boulderweekly.com
http://www.boulderweekly.com/incaseyoumissedit.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
When the jury in the Judi Bari trial requested copies of the First and Fourth Amendments this week, the FBI showed its true stripes by objecting. The jury asked for copies of the amendments to the U.S. Constitution to consider during deliberation, but Department of Justice council attorney Joseph Sher and City of Oakland attorney Marie Bee asked the judge not to grant their request.
The judge overruled the motion to oppose and read those amendments to the jury, but did not give the jury an actual copy of those amendments for them to return to the deliberation room.
Why would the FBI, a federal agency governed by the Constitution and its amendments, object to the jury having access to the law of the land? Perhaps because the FBI so often violates the Constitution.
"Their agents obviously haven't read the Constitution, so why would they want anyone else looking at it?" said Darryl Cherney, co-plaintiff in the civil rights lawsuit, now in its sixth week.
Four FBI agents and three Oakland police officers are on trial for allegedly denying equal protection under the law to Bari and Cherney, who were nearly killed when a bomb exploded in Bari's car. The FBI named the two as the primary suspects in the case, failing to follow up on leads and death threats Bari had received prior to the bombing. The lawsuit also alleges the FBI and police used the bombing to begin a smear campaign against Bari and Cherney, characterizing them as terrorists. The two were organizing for Redwood Summer at the time of the bombing.
White folks baffled
A bunch of white folks in Eaton, Colo., are confused. Why are American Indians upset? Just because Eaton High School calls its teams the Fightin' Reds and uses a squat, shovel-nosed cartoon depiction of an Indian as its mascot doesn't mean them Indians need to get upset. Or does it?
About 300 American Indians and their supporters marched through Eaton this week to protest the high school's use of a term and an image they believe is racist and insulting. "Red," short for "redskin," is held by most American Indians in much the same light as black Americans view the word "*."
But the white folks, mostly farmers, are having none of that.
"It's a tough little warrior that we're very proud of," said one local. "None of us feels like it's a negative portrayal."
Of course, none of them are Indian either, a fact pointed out by protesters, who say it should not be up to whites to decide what constitutes an honor to Indian people.
Protesters, including members of the American Indian Movement, have vowed to repeat their march through Eaton if the town doesn't change the name. It's a good bet they mean what they say. Perhaps it's time for Eaton to begin considering alternatives.
How about adding a few letters and calling themselves the Fightin' Rednecks? Or Fightin' Chinks? Or Fightin' *? Or Fightin' Crackers? Fightin' Krauts? Fightin' Wetbacks? Fightin' Wops? Fightin' Coolies?
If Eaton residents find any of those suggested names offensive, they've taken their first step toward understanding what all the fuss is about.
Bush campaigning again
George W. is already hard at working on his re-election campaign. In response to former President Jimmy Carter's ground-breaking visit to Cuba last week, Bush went on the campaign trail in Florida to let Cuban Americans know that he does not plan on lifting sanctions against the island nation any time soon. Carter and a host of humanitarian groups had urged Bush to drop the 40-year-old sanctions, which have caused great hardship for Cuban people.
While Bush was probably hoping to come off looking tough on communism, the politics behind his speeches and stop in Miami are transparent. It was Cuban voters that carried Bush to a narrow victory in Florida, the state that decided the 2000 election. Bush's brother Jeb, Florida's governor, is facing re-election this year and is also depending on the Cuban vote, which typically runs conservative.
So sorry to the people of Cuba. Maybe in a non-election year.
Fast track to hell
A bill before the U.S. Senate is so far-reaching that it could impact the lives of every American. The bill would cede to the U.S. president the ability to negotiate trade agreements, or fast track authority.
"In order for me to be effective on trade, I need trade promotion authority," President Bush told reporters. "I need the ability to speak with a single voice for our country."
Labor groups oppose fast track authority because it will almost assuredly send U.S. jobs overseas. Human-rights groups oppose it because it will erode workers' rights at home and promote the abuse of children as virtual slave labor abroad. Environmental groups oppose it because it will allow U.S. companies to evade environmental laws by moving operations to countries without laws.
Yeah, yeah. That's all terrible. But here's what's scarier: Bush thinking he's speaking on behalf of all Americans "in a single voice." A forked tongue is more like it.
Respond: letters@boulderweekly.com
http://www.boulderweekly.com/incaseyoumissedit.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Comments
By Josh Meyer in Washington
May 28 2002
Related links:
Sharp note from a whistleblower
FBI officials in Washington not only stymied an investigation into flight school student Zacarias Moussaoui before September 11, but also tried to stop field agents linking the suspected 20th hijacker to the terrorist attacks after they occurred, an agent claims in a 13-page "whistle-blower" letter.
Agent Coleen Rowley, the chief lawyer in the Minneapolis field office, alleges that intelligence on Moussaoui provided by the French Government, which included information on his "activities connected with Osama bin Laden", was more than enough to obtain a warrant to search his laptop computer in the weeks before the terrorist attacks.
But requests for a warrant were thwarted by FBI supervisors in Washington, who seemed so intent on ignoring the threat Moussaoui posed that some field agents speculated that key officials at FBI headquarters "had to be spies or moles ... working for Osama bin Laden".
In her letter, Ms Rowley accuses the FBI director, Robert Mueller, of making it appear the FBI had no concrete evidence that Moussaoui was involved in planning the terrorist attacks until after the September 11 strikes took place.
"To get to the point, I have deep concerns that a delicate and subtle shading /skewing of facts by you and others at the highest levels of FBI management has occurred and is occurring," Ms Rowley said.
Parts of her letter have been leaked, and Time magazine has posted them on its Web site. But the FBI refused to comment on the letter, which it considers classified.
The chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Carl Levin, a Democrat, said: "The only way, I believe, that we're going to get to the bottom of this thing is if we have a broad investigation with a blue-ribbon panel, but also if we release the documents now and hold people accountable."
The Senate Majority Leader, Tom Daschle, also a Democrat, said the letter was proof that an independent commission was needed to investigate the FBI, despite vigorous opposition from the White House.
Senator Daschle said President George Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney lobbied him in January "not to investigate the events of September 11".
The full disclosure of Ms Rowley's letter came as a US official confirmed that the Federal Aviation Administration had told airlines more than three years ago to be on a "high degree of alertness" against hijackings by bin Laden followers.
Ms Rowley said that within days of Moussaoui's arrest, FBI agents in Minneapolis were convinced he was a dangerous Islamic militant who had sought aviation training to carry out acts of terrorism.
"Even after the attacks had begun," she said, a supervising agent in Washington "was still attempting to block the search of Moussaoui's computer, characterising the World Trade Centre attacks as a mere coincidence with Minneapolis's prior suspicions about Moussaoui."
Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post
http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/05/28/1022243318700.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Oliver will speed up firings of rogue officers, turn them over to prosecutors
By Norman Sinclair / The Detroit News
Donna Terek / The Detroit News
"I'm going tell you right now we are going to run off a lot of people."
-- Detroit Police Chief Jerry Oliver
Oliver's other plans
* Giving officers small retractable batons and other nonlethal weapons, including electric cattle prods, so officers have more alternatives to using lethal force.
* Hiring a police-training expert to supervise all department training, including how and when to use lethal and nonlethal force.
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DETROIT -- Police Chief Jerry A. Oliver Sr. said his department has criminals in its officer ranks, and he is gearing up to fire them as soon as he can.
"I'm going tell you right now we are going to run off a lot of people, because we've got some criminals that work for us here," Oliver told The Detroit News in an interview about changes he plans for the department.
A breakdown in accountability in the 4,300-officer department, serious lapses in the disciplinary process and union resistance have allowed the cases of hundreds of officers accused of misconduct to languish for years, Oliver said.
"Part of the department's problem is no one is held accountable," Oliver said. "Everybody is able to get out from under any charges. We have another 200 or 300 cases in the hopper from Internal Affairs -- we're that far behind -- and many of those cases are serious cases where police officers have committed crimes, and yet they are still here."
Oliver said he will fire officers who violate their oaths by committing felony and misdemeanor crimes. The department -- long criticized for failing to aggressively investigate officers accused of wrongdoing -- only automatically fires officers who are convicted of felonies.
Oliver's comments were criticized as inflammatory by union leaders and attorneys, but they were praised by civil-rights activists.
The department's treatment of civilians is under investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice -- an investigation sparked by a string of highly publicized fatal shootings by Detroit police officers in the late 1990s.
Martin Bandemer, president of the Detroit Police Officers Association, said he doesn't know of any criminals on the force.
"To the best of my knowledge, any officer accused of a felony would be suspended without pay. So I don't know who these criminals could be," Bandemer said. "I can assure the citizens of Detroit that the men and women of this department are hard-working, underpaid officers, working seven days a week doing so much with so little."
Heaster Wheeler, executive director of the NAACP's Detroit Branch, said clearing the department of bad officers would help increase the public's trust in the force.
"There is an image problem, a potentially serious credibility gap, in Detroit and many of the surrounding police agencies," Wheeler said. "If this helps to restore some of that credibility, it's a good thing."
Oliver, who came to Detroit in January after a six-year stint in Richmond, Va., said he expects legal battles with police unions.
"In the past, I believe the leaders of this organization were overwhelmed with human issues and contract issues," he said. "I'm willing to take those on because the fight we have in this organization is that we've got to rid ourselves of these people."
But John Goldpaugh, a lawyer for the police officers union, accused Oliver of trying to trample on officers' rights. "The chief wants to fire officers without due-process rights or without a hearing and then say come on back and file your grievance," he said.
Oliver countered that he believes in police values above all. "We get hung up on irrelevant trivial stuff on the side and forget about the honor, the integrity of the code of ethics that we all swore to uphold," he said.
Oliver said he will use that code of ethics to fire officers who commit misdemeanor or felony crimes on the grounds that they violated the oaths they took when they joined the department.
"Where the real show-stopper comes in is the Code of Ethics that every employee, every police officer swears to keep their private lives unsullied, that they will live a life above reproach, and where they will not tolerate in themselves or anyone else, misconduct or criminality," he said.
Oliver also plans to speed up the disciplinary process. The Internal Affairs Section, which investigates officer misconduct, is overwhelmed by a backlog of hundreds of cases, many of them criminal offenses, he said.
Oliver pointed to the case of an officer he fired last Monday -- four years after he was brought up on department charges of having sex with a female prisoner in the ninth-floor cell block of the Police Department's headquarters.
"Since 1998, this guy has remained on the payroll. He's been coming to work every day. And we've got two or three hundred others just like him that are roaming around out there that have done egregious things, but they are still with us," Oliver said.
But Goldpaugh said that the officer fired last week was not a criminal because he was never charged with a crime. He said the department failed to bring him up for a hearing until six months ago, and at that time the officer admitted to the sexual encounter.
Oliver fired him after an arbitrator ruled he should be fired, Goldpaugh said.
"No one says that changes (in disciplinary procedures) shouldn't occur," he said. "But the changes have to be done in an appropriate way -- and that's what this chief doesn't seem to want to follow."
Goldpaugh said that through arbitration decisions, collective bargaining and agreements between the city and the unions dating back to the 1970s, the department's policy is that officers formally charged with felonies are immediately suspended without pay pending the outcome in court. If they are convicted of the charges, they are fired.
Officers charged with misdemeanors, however, face suspension only after departmental hearings or after a conviction in court. They then could be brought up on department charges and could be fired after those proceedings.
In cases where officers are fired but then regain their jobs through arbitration, Oliver said he will ask the state regulatory agency that certifies all Michigan police officers to revoke the officers' certifications.
"If they are finally found not guilty and they are put back to work, they will not come back as police officers but as civilians," he said.
Oliver said he will urge Wayne County Prosecutor Michael Duggan to prosecute officers who, in the past, might have escaped prosecution because prosecutors gave them breaks out of professional courtesy.
Goldpaugh said, however, that the state does not automatically decertify officers convicted of misdemeanors.
"It appears to me that the chief's position is that if you are charged with a misdemeanor -- regardless of its nature -- you can't be a police officer," he said. "Well one of those (misdemeanors) is domestic assaults, and because I have an altercation with my wife or significant other ... does that mean the guy should be fired automatically?"
But two leaders of civil rights groups cautiously praised Oliver's plans.
"If we see in a short time a more efficient investigation process -- while still adhering to standards of due process -- that will be a sign of definite proactive action by the department," said Kary L. Moss, executive director of the Michigan American Civil Liberties Union.
Wheeler, the NAACP Detroit Branch's executive director, said the moves might help the department improve its image with the public, especially among youth. Right now, he said, when he talks to young kids, few say they would ever consider a career in law enforcement.
Chris Davis, who lives in the 8th (Grand River) Precinct and is a member of the Chief's Advisory Committee, said she welcomes the idea of ridding the department of bad officers.
But Davis said she fears Oliver's take-no-prisoners style might broom good officers who need help. "I think it's a good idea, but how far is it going to go?" she said.
Detroit News Staff Writer Jennifer Brooks contributed to this report. You can reach Norman Sinclair at (313) 222-2034 or nsinclair@detnews.com. http://www.detnews.com/2002/metro/0205/28/a01-500575.htm
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
Problems With E-Mail Surveillance Program Led to Mishandling of al Qaeda Probe in 2000, Memo Says
By Dan Eggen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 29, 2002; Page A07
The FBI mishandled a surveillance operation involving Osama bin Laden's terror network two years ago because of technical problems with the controversial Carnivore e-mail program, part of a "pattern" indicating that the FBI was unable to manage its intelligence wiretaps, according to an internal bureau memorandum released yesterday.
An attempt in March 2000 to secretly monitor the e-mail of an unidentified suspect went awry when the Carnivore program retrieved communications from other parties as well, according to the memo, which was obtained by the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), a Washington-based advocacy group opposed to the technology.
Carnivore, which has been renamed DCS1000, is a computer program that allows investigators to capture e-mails sent to and from criminal and terrorist suspects. But the newly released memo indicates that, in at least one case, the program also retrieved e-mails from innocent people not involved in the investigation.
The incident joined a rapidly growing list of alleged FBI mistakes made before Sept. 11, including evidence that FBI headquarters bungled the quest for a search warrant in the Zacarias Moussaoui case and ignored pointed warnings from an Arizona field agent about terrorists in flight training. It also invited fresh criticism of Carnivore, a program already derided by civil libertarians, and cast doubt on repeated FBI assurances that the program provides a "surgical" ability to grab targeted e-mails out of cyberspace.
"Carnivore is a powerful but clumsy tool that endangers the privacy of innocent American citizens," said David Sobel, general counsel for EPIC, which obtained the memo through a lawsuit filed under the Freedom of Information Act. "We have now learned that its imprecision can also jeopardize important investigations, including those involving terrorism."
FBI spokesman John Collingwood said yesterday that the case was a rare mistake that resulted from technical problems encountered by an Internet service provider, not by the FBI.
"This is an uncommon instance where a surveillance tool, despite being tested and employed with the assistance of a service provider, did not collect information as intended," Collingwood said.
The one-page memo at issue, dated April 5, 2000, and sent via e-mail, was intended to outline the problems that had arisen in a Denver terrorism case for Marion "Spike" Bowman, the FBI's associate general counsel for national security. Yesterday, Bowman declined to comment and authorities declined to identify the memo's author or provide further details about the case.
The probe involved the FBI team that investigates suspected operatives of the al Qaeda network. It is known as the Usama bin Laden, or UBL, unit for the agency's spelling of the al Qaeda leader's name. The same unit has come under congressional scrutiny in recent weeks over its role in shelving a July 2001 memo from Phoenix FBI agent Kenneth Williams, who had suggested that al Qaeda members might be infiltrating aviation schools and requested that the FBI canvass them for Middle Easterners.
In the latest case to come to light, the UBL unit acquired in March 2000 a warrant under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) for use against a suspect in an investigation based in Denver, according to the memo released yesterday.
The names of the suspect and all others in the memo, except for Bowman's, were redacted from the copy provided to EPIC.
The memo says that on March 16, 2000, the Carnivore "software was turned on and did not work properly," capturing e-mails involving both the target and others unconnected to the case.
The memo goes on to say that "the FBI technical person was apparently so upset that he destroyed all the E-Mail take, including the take" from the target. Collingwood, the FBI spokesman, said that the memo is incorrect and that the e-mails gathered in the operation were kept and remain under seal in the court that administers secret wiretaps.
The memo makes clear that the Justice Department's Office of Intelligence Policy and Review (OIPR), which oversees FISA warrants, was enraged by the blunders in the case, in part because the Justice Department office was allegedly not told that Carnivore was considered experimental at the time.
Referring to an official at OIPR, the memo's author says: "[To] state that she is unhappy with [the International Terrorism Operations Section] and the UBL Unit would be an understatement of incredible proportions."
The memo also refers to an electronic communication outlining other "FISA mistakes" and alleges "a pattern of occurrences which indicate to OIPR an inability on the part of the FBI to manage its FISAs."
One law enforcement official said last night that the passage may be referring to the ongoing problems with the affidavits submitted by the FBI to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which approves surveillance requests. The court barred one FBI agent from submitting affidavits in late 2000 because of misrepresentations, and a broad review found similar problems in other cases, sources said.
The FBI has been using the Carnivore system for almost three years, subject to court authorization, to tap into Internet communications, to identify e-mail writers online and to record the contents of messages. It does so by capturing "packets" of information containing those details.
Civil liberties advocates and some lawmakers have expressed concerns because the system could scan private communication on the legal activities of people other than those under investigation. But agency officials have said repeatedly in response to criticism that the system poses no threat to privacy because it can take narrow, targeted slices of communication.
That's what FBI officials told Congress in the summer of 2000, only a few months after the botched surveillance effort in the Denver case.
Shortly before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, an FBI spokesman said the agency rarely used Carnivore because Internet service providers had become so adept at meeting the technical demands of approved surveillance of suspects' Internet traffic. The agency said it had used Carnivore only twice from January through mid-August.
Since then, the agency has repeatedly declined to discuss the number of times the system has been used in recent months, saying that the records of Carnivore's use are exempt from disclosure laws.
Staff writer Robert O'Harrow Jr. contributed to this report.
c 2002 The Washington Post Company
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A24213-2002May28.html
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
The FBI destroyed evidence about terrorist Osama bin Laden because its e-mail wiretap system mistakenly gathered information it was not entitled to.
The FBI's Carnivore software not only spied on e-mails of its target "but also picked up e-mails on non-covered targets," said a March 2000 memo to agency headquarters in Washington.
"The FBI technical person was apparently so upset that he destroyed all the e-mail take, including the take on" the suspect, the memo said.
The documents were made public through a request filed under the Freedom of Information Act by Electronic Privacy Information Center, a Washington advocacy group. The documents were not included in an original release but became public after a federal judge ordered the FBI to reveal more information.
"At issue was an investigation in Denver in which the FBI's bin Laden unit was using the bureau's Carnivore system to conduct electronic surveillance of a suspect under a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrant," the Associated Press reported today.
"The memo surfaced as the FBI was addressing concerns it mishandled aspects of terrorism investigation prior to the Sept. 11 attacks. Those concerns include a warning from its Phoenix office about Arab pilots training in the United States last July."
The Justice Department's Office of Intelligence and Policy Review was furious after learning the evidence was destroyed, according to the memo.
"To state that she was unhappy at ITOS [International Terrorism Operations Center] and the UBL [bin Laden] unit is an understatement," the memo said, quoting a Justice official.
Justice officials worried the destruction of the evidence would show an "inability on the part of the FBI to manage" the warrants, which are crucial tools in fighting terrorism.
Privacy groups and some congressmen have complained that Carnivore could collect more data than permitted by a warrant.
"Here's confirmation of the fact that not only did it do that, but it resulted in a loss of legitimately acquired intelligence," said David Sobel, general counsel of Electronic Privacy Information Center.
FBI officials today would not comment on the Carnivore memo or the inquiry. http://www.newsmax.com/showinsidecover.shtml?a=2002/5/28/180654
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
The new, New FBI
Posted: May 29, 2002
1:00 a.m. Eastern
c 2002 WorldNetDaily.com
The Department of Justice announced sweeping reforms to the FBI in the wake of the armchair quarterbacking of how it handled information in the Old Normal before 9-11.
In the New Normal, the FBI has a new mandate. Prevent terrorism. Period.
Officially, and for the first time, the new mandate will "explicitly establish protection of the United States and the American people from terrorism as the highest priority and central mission of the FBI."
Blame for the intelligence failures in advance of the Sept. 11 attacks ultimately settled on the shoulders of FBI Director Robert Mueller. After being raked over the coals by the Senate Intelligence Committee, Mueller announced the re-organization.
The new mandate means a fundamental change in the FBI's role that goes beyond what it appears to be at first glance.
To all intents and purposes, the new FBI is destined to become America's first federal internal security service. Its reorganization takes it out of the criminal-investigative realm and into the realm of preventative security.
Why is that significant? Preventative security can only be accomplished by converting the FBI from a federal law-enforcement agency into a domestic spy service.
The FBI will now shift its focus to meet its new priorities. Job One, protecting the U.S. from terrorist attacks, will involve the creation of a new domestic intelligence service. It was also given seven other priorities, including protecting the U.S. from attacks from cyberspace, investigating public corruption and civil-rights violations and fighting domestic and international organized crime.
The FBI has a major job facing it. First, there is the famous and well entrenched FBI paranoia ? a part of the Hoover Hangover it hasn't been able to shake in the quarter century since the death of its first director.
The Bureau is also planning to hire several thousand new agents, set up intelligence transfer mechanisms between the Bureau and the CIA and try and encourage more individual initiative among its agents.
The FBI will also create a new "Flying Squad" ? a mobile counter-terrorism unit ready to deploy anywhere in the world at a moment's notice.
The FBI is going to get a headquarters makeover, computer systems upgrade and new bosses to help them adjust to their new role.
The FBI got involved in domestic espionage in its efforts to root out communists ? within a decade, they got caught spying on everybody from Martin Luther King to Bobby Kennedy.
After the death of J. Edgar Hoover, we saw the New FBI ? a kinder, gentler, more socially conscious agency more concerned with politics than law enforcement.
One of the reasons cited for missing the signs of 9-11 was the FBI's unwillingness to follow up on leads of Arabs taking flight lessons because of an unwillingness to profile possible terrorists according to ethnic background.
The new, New FBI looks a lot like the old, Old FBI.
The problem is, for all the dangers associated with it, I can't see any alternative. Neither can anybody else.
The terrorists have been able to accomplish in six months what the Cold War couldn't do in 50 years.
How much freedom will we trade for security? A lot more than we think.
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Hal Lindsey is the best-selling author of 20 books, including "Late Great Planet Earth." He writes this weekly column exclusively for WorldNetDaily and maintains a website where he provides up-to-the-minute analysis of today's world events in the light of ancient prophecies.
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
"Native Americans" is a more proper term however; the natives had no idea they lived in "America" at the time, or that this is what it was called.
If one is offended- I usually change my term.
I thought that folks who believed otherwise were "crazy idiots"?
Hmmm....I think this must be a hoax. The Government is madly in love with the Constitution and would never do anything to bypass it, especially not by force!
Stand And Be Counted
"If cowardly and dishonorable men sometimes shoot unarmed men with army pistols or guns, the evil must be prevented by the penitentiary and gallows, and not by a general deprivation of a constitutional privilege." - Arkansas Supreme Court, 1878
If this just not take the cake, then what.
Boomer
Protect our Constitutional Rights.
Where in the Heck do you find this stuff about Colo?? I live here and read the papers and never hear anything???
Just a wondering??
Of course I can play the piano, as long as it has pedals!
The last days of America .....
It's natural Law all things are born get strong prosper become decadent,degenerate toward a putrid state and just drop dead !!!!
America is no exeption ..... So Become a WORM and feed on the Carcass.....May be only way to survive .......
JD
Poor choice of destiny make thoose that for upholding the law go against the "LAW".
Or a group of us who know how it's supposed to be,could pick-up the
pieces,and make it right again.(It may just be a dream,but it's a nice one.)