[Eric in the Ozarks]

Bureaucrats win.

[Wristpin]

UNNNGH...

[Libertina]

Big fat BTTT Yeah NewsMax!

[Valpal1]

The secret court went so far as to discipline Michael Resnick, the F.B.I. supervisor in charge of coordinating terrorist surveillance operations, saying they would no longer accept warrant applications from him.

Would this have anything to do with the recently resigning judge. Hmmmmm.

[ncpatriot]

"Keep it simple"

This article is simple. President Bush is right.

[vetsvette]

To expect that America's "newspaper of record" would be either consistent or accurate in its reporting is just tilting at windmills. Neither consistency nor accuracy is warranted if it doesn't support the proper ideology.

Somebody should turn old Pinch over to the terrorists for a weekend or so just for drill - it could never change the jackass's viewpoint, but it would be an elixir of sorts for everyone else.

[Jim Noble]

Zacarias Moussaoui should have been put up against a wall on Lower Broadway and shot on September 12, 2001.

[zeugma]

This is an interesting article, especially in light of the fact that this "court" denied exactly one request during the Clinton administration. Could this be political games being played by the judges?

[FairOpinion]

Thanks for pointing this out. The Dems would like us to have forgotten it.

[MizSterious]

This is one of the reasons, and I'm sure there are others.

But, as the Washington Times editorial says, according to the 'Rats, they're the only ones who should be allowed to wiretap.

[Peach]

This can't be stated often enough, imo. It's as though the leftists don't WANT us to catch the jihadists.

[oceanview]

what this shows is that the courts cannot be trusted to conduct a domestic war on terror involving agents of foreign powers on US soil. there are simply too many protections offered by our judicial system, its a system that is primarily designed to deal with crime AFTER it has occurred - which is of no use when trying to stop domestic terrorism.

[talkshowamerica]

This really doesn't surprise me. As a 25 year veteran law enforcement officer, I have seen this all too many times, although not on the level of National Security. These pompous ass judges apply their own standards to the issuing of search warrants, not the standards set forth in the law.

In order to obtain a search warrant a law enforcement officer merely needs to provide probable cause in his affidavit for that warrant that he believes that what he is looking for will be found where his is asking to search, he has to articulate the specific person, place or thing to be searched.

He needs only satisfy a basis of knowledge standard or a veracity standard in applying for the warrant. (In some states you need both, MA. is one of them) Certainly a Federal Agent should satisfy both prongs of the test. ( Aguilar v Texas, Spinelli v U.S.)

Unfortunately many Judges ignore this probable cause and basis of knowledge/veracity test, and almost require you to prove beyond a reasonable doubt (the standard used for conviction) before they'll issue a search warrant. This is utterly ridiculous and certainly hampers law enforcement efforts to protect citizens against criminals and in this case terrorists.

Probable cause for search warrants is basically defined as: Facts and circumstances that would lead a reasonable and prudent person to believe that a crime has been, is being or is about to be committed and evidence you are searching for is evidence of that crime.

In this case the crime would have been conducting a terrorist plot to attack the United States and conspiracy to to conduct a terrorist attack against the United States.

There was more than enough reasonable suspicion of possible criminal activity here to have probable cause to issue the warrant, especially in the FISA court.

[neodad]

Link to actual memo: http://www.apfn.org/apfn/WTC_whistleblower1.htm

[gondramB]

""The F.B.I.," officials told the Times, "had become wary after a well-regarded supervisor was disciplined because the [FISA] court complained that he had submitted improper information on applications."

The secret court went so far as to discipline Michael Resnick, the F.B.I. supervisor in charge of coordinating terrorist surveillance operations, saying they would no longer accept warrant applications from him. "

That sounds like the court was saying that the FBI lied on an application.

[anglian]

Michael Resnick, who was working under the radical Fundamentalist Unit of the FBI, was reprimanded by Attorney General Janet Reno for “filing misleading affidavits’ to the courts to try to obtain search warrants to eavesdrop on people “suspected of being foreign agents of international terrorists.” The seven judges on the court charged that FBI supervisor Michael Resnick, in charge of surveilling Hamas, had been presenting them with misleading affidavits, which seems like a judicious way of saying he'd been lying to them. Mr. Specter said the Senate Judiciary Committee should question the supervisor, Michael Resnick, and even the members of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which issues national security search warrants, but only informally, to find out what happened.>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Secret Court Rebuffs Ashcroft Justice Dept Posted: Friday, August 23, 2002 FISA applications are voluminous documents, containing boilerplate language as well as details specific to each circumstance. In one case, the FISA judges were so angered by inaccuracies in affidavits submitted by FBI agent Michael Resnick that they barred him from ever appearing before the court, according to the ruling and government sources. Referring to "the troubling number of inaccurate FBI affidavits in so many FISA applications," the court said in its opinion: "In virtually every instance, the government's misstatements and omissions in FISA applications and violations of the Court's orders involved information sharing and unauthorized disseminations to criminal investigators and prosecutors." ____________ Despite the fact that the department admitted in September of 2000 that it violated the evidence-sharing rules in 75 cases, no network ever uttered the name “Janet Reno,” the Attorney General at the time. The court that works in secret is now publicly accusing the FBI of giving it misleading information in order to get wiretaps and surveillance on spies and terrorists. The 75 cases the court cites took place during the Clinton administration. Some 75 FBI wiretap requests were rejected because the court said they were full of inaccuracies and misrepresentations. Former FBI Director Louis Freeh even signed off on one that is said to have been misleading. Under the Bush administration those errors were corrected and new procedure for requesting wiretaps adopted. And one judge on the court said quote, 'We consistently find the (FISA) applications 'well-scrubbed' by the Attorney General and his staff before they are presented to us. The process is working. It is working in part because the Attorney General is conscientiously doing his job, as is his staff.'”

[Mo1]

The secret court went so far as to discipline Michael Resnick, the F.B.I. supervisor in charge of coordinating terrorist surveillance operations, saying they would no longer accept warrant applications from him.

Because of paperwork???

[rdb3]

Whoa!

[VOA]

Intelligence officials told the Times that the FISA Court's
decision to reprimand
Resnick, who had been a rising star in the FBI,
"resulted in making the Bureau far less aggressive in seeking
information on terrorists."

No good deed goes unpunished.
I hope Agent Resnick finally was vindicated and didn't have his
career busted.

BUT, having seen the case of John O'Neill, I wouldn't be suprised
if Resnick got the punishment handed out to agents by Hoover:
banishment to the Oklahoma City office.

More on O'Neill's case (even if it's from PBS Frontline):
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/knew/

[Tarantulas]

"Sen. Charles Grassley is among those who think that the FBI might have been able to stop the 9/11 attacks if the FISA Court hadn't discouraged the Bureau from aggressively pursuing a warrant in the Moussaoui case."

I just watched a fellow conservative get reamed by lefties because he linked to this NewsMax article and then discovered that NewsMax got yet another story wrong. The FISA court didn't discourage the Bureau from anything because the Bureau never submitted the request for a warrant. Here's Senator Grassley's letter - note that the date is 2003, not 2002 - another NewsMax error:

http://www.techlawjournal.com/cong108/fisa/20030109.asp

I've been burned too many times by NewsMax stories to ever again use them as a reference.