An internal Justice Department report accuses the FBI of underreporting its use of the Patriot Act to force businesses to turn over customer information in terrorism cases, according to officials familiar with its findings. (AP GRAPHIC)
Posted on 03/08/2007 8:30:36 PM PST by NormsRevenge
WASHINGTON - A blistering Justice Department report accuses the FBI of underreporting its use of the Patriot Act to force businesses to turn over customer information in terrorism cases, according to officials familiar with its findings.
The report, to be released Friday, also says the FBI failed to send follow-up subpoenas to telecommunications firms that were told to expect them, according to several government officials who spoke on condition of anonymity because the report by the Justice Department's inspector general had not yet been released.
Overall, the FBI underreported the number of national security letters it issued by about 20 percent between 2003 and 2005, the officials said. In 2005 alone, the FBI delivered a total of 9,254 letters relating to 3,501 U.S. citizens and legal residents.
The Patriot Act, pushed through Congress by the Bush administration after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks, allows the FBI to issue national security letters without a judge's approval in terrorism and espionage cases. The letters require telephone companies, Internet service providers, banks, credit bureaus and other businesses to produce highly personal records about their customers or subscribers.
It was unclear late Thursday whether the omissions could be considered a criminal offense. One government official familiar with the report said that it concluded that the problems appeared to be unintentional and that FBI agents would probably face administrative sanctions instead of an indictment.
The audit, required by Congress over the objections of the Bush administration, contains classified information about how the government pursues terrorists and spies in the United States. The Justice Department began notifying lawmakers of its damning contents late Thursday.
FBI Director Robert Mueller was to brief reporters on the report's findings Friday morning, and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was expected to answer questions about it at a privacy rights event in Washington several hours later.
An internal Justice Department report accuses the FBI of underreporting its use of the Patriot Act to force businesses to turn over customer information in terrorism cases, according to officials familiar with its findings. (AP GRAPHIC)
Safety, freedom, Ben Franklin, etc. etc.
who wrote the report - Clinton holdovers at DOJ?
on the face of it, investigations into 3501 people - isn't a big number. let's wait and see the details, the Dems are just salivating to take down the Patriot Act.
who wrote the report - Clinton holdovers at DOJ?
--
the report by the Justice Department's inspector general had not yet been released.
--
Glenn A. Fine
U. S. Department of Justice
Office of the Inspector General
http://www.usdoj.gov/oig/glennfine.htm
Glenn A. Fine was confirmed by the United States Senate as the Inspector General for the Department of Justice on December 15, 2000.
Mr. Fine has worked for the Department of Justice Office of the Inspector General (OIG) since January 1995. Initially, he was Special Counsel to the Inspector General. In 1996, he became the Director of the OIG's Special Investigations and Review Unit.
Before joining the OIG, Mr. Fine was an attorney specializing in labor and employment law at a law firm in Washington, D.C. Prior to that, from 1986 to 1989, Mr. Fine served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Washington, D.C., United States Attorney's Office. In that capacity, he prosecuted more than 35 criminal jury trials, handled numerous grand jury investigations, and argued cases in the District of Columbia and U.S. Courts of Appeals.
Mr. Fine graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College in 1979 with an A.B. degree in economics. At Harvard, he was co-captain of the varsity basketball team and was drafted by the San Antonio Spurs of the National Basketball Association. Mr. Fine was a Rhodes Scholar and earned B.A. and M.A. degrees from Oxford University. He received his law degree magna cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1985.
The Patriot Act took down Jamie Gorelick's wall. Sounds like the 'rats want to put it up again.
The number tells me most of the story. If we cannot use the FBI to investigate possible terrorism leads against 3501 people (note: citizens and residents), then we might as well just pack it up and let them beat us. That's a tiny number.
now there may well have been some procedural errors here, and those should be rectified. but I hardly see some huge civil rights violations here. the IRS uses more intrusive methods, without court orders, on far more people then this everyday.
Where was the Justice Department IG back in the 1990's?
FBI criticized for Patriot Act use
WASHINGTON - An internal Justice Department report accuses the FBI of underreporting its use of the Patriot Act to force telecommunications and financial firms to turn over customer information in suspected terrorism cases, according to officials familiar with its findings.
Shoddy bookkeeping and records management led to the problems, said one government official familiar with the report. The official said FBI agents appeared to be overwhelmed by the volume of demands for information over a two-year period.
"They lost track," said the official who like others interviewed late Thursday spoke on condition of anonymity because the report had not been released.
The errors are outlined by Justice Department Inspector General Glenn A. Fine in an audit to be released on Friday. The audit requirement was added to the Patriot Act by Congress over the objections of the Bush administration.
The FBI in 2005 reported to Congress that its agents had delivered a total of 9,254 national security letters seeking e-mail, telephone or financial information on 3,501 U.S. citizens and legal residents over the previous two years. Fine's report, according to officials, says that number was underreported by 20 percent.
It was unclear late Thursday whether the omissions could be considered a criminal offense. One government official who read the report said it concluded the problems appeared to be unintentional and that FBI agents would probably face administrative sanctions instead of criminal charges.
The FBI has taken steps to correct some of the problems, the official said.
The Justice Department, already facing congressional criticism over its firing of eight U.S. attorneys, began notifying lawmakers of the audit's damning contents late Thursday. Spokesmen at the Justice Department and FBI declined to immediately comment on the findings.
FBI Director Robert Mueller was to brief reporters on the audit Friday morning, and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales was expected to answer questions about it at a privacy rights event in Washington several hours later.
Sen. Charles E. Schumer, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee that oversees the FBI, called the reported findings "a profoundly disturbing breach of public trust."
"Somebody has a lot of explaining to do," said Schumer, D-N.Y.
Fine's audit also says the FBI failed to send follow-up subpoenas to telecommunications firms that were told to expect them, the officials said.
Those cases involved so-called exigent letters to alert the firms that subpoenas would be issued shortly to gather more information, the officials said. But in many examples, the subpoenas were never sent, the officials said.
The FBI has since caught up with those omissions, either with national security letters or subpoenas, one official said.
National security letters have been the subject of legal battles in two federal courts because recipients were barred from telling anyone about them.
The American Civil Liberties Union sued the Bush administration over what the watchdog group described as the security letter's gag on free speech.
Last May, a federal appeals judge in New York warned that government's ability to force companies to turn over information about its customers and keep quiet about it was probably unconstitutional.
One day the sociocons/neocons will rue the day they supported the PA.
Just wait till Hillary or her ilk get hold of it.
But wait, it wasn't meant to be used on me...
I've often been puzzled as to why people who call themselves conservative supported this thing...parts of it may be necessary, but it's allowed Bush and Co. to get away with stuff that Clinton would have (rightfully) been reamed for.
Sheep like fear...something this administration has nurtured in the citizens by positing worst case scenarios that really are unlikely...
Even when we were crouching under our desks fearing a nuclear attack from the Soviet Union in the early 60's the U.S. government knew better then to propose a police state Act like the PA. Americans have become wimps and are encouraged to be so by our government. I am supposed to be more afraid of shadowy threats from backward little ME countries then I was of Nikita Khrushchev and the Soviet Union? What a joke we have become....End rant/
Now everyone go back to watching American Idol. Washington is "protecting" you..LOL
I'm with you on that.
The only difference is an (R).
Freedom is Slavery
War is Peace
Ignorance is Strength
The proletarians will never revolt, not in a thousand years or a million. They cannot. I do not have to tell you the reason: you know it already. If you have ever cherished any dreams of violent insurrection, you must abandon them. There is no way in which the Party can be overthrown. The rule of the Party is for ever. Make that the starting-point of your thoughts.'
He came closer to the bed. 'For ever!' he repeated. 'And now let us get back to the question of "how" and "why". You understand well enough how the Party maintains itself in power. Now tell me why we cling to power. What is our motive? Why should we want power? Go on, speak,' he added as Winston remained silent.
Nevertheless Winston did not speak for another moment or two. A feeling of weariness had overwhelmed him. The faint, mad gleam of enthusiasm had come back into O'Brien's face. He knew in advance what O'Brien would say. That the Party did not seek power for its own ends, but only for the good of the majority. That it sought power because men in the mass were frail cowardly creatures who could not endure liberty or face the truth, and must be ruled over and systematically deceived by others who were stronger than themselves. That the choice for mankind lay between freedom and happiness, and that, for the great bulk of mankind, happiness was better. That the party was the eternal guardian of the weak, a dedicated sect doing evil that good might come, sacrificing its own happiness to that of others. The terrible thing, thought Winston, the terrible thing was that when O'Brien said this he would believe it. You could see it in his face. O'Brien knew everything. A thousand times better than Winston he knew what the world was really like, in what degradation the mass of human beings lived and by what lies and barbarities the Party kept them there. He had understood it all, weighed it all, and it made no difference: all was justified by the ultimate purpose. What can you do, thought Winston, against the lunatic who is more intelligent than yourself, who gives your arguments a fair hearing and then simply persists in his lunacy?
'You are ruling over us for our own good,' he said feebly. 'You believe that human beings are not fit to govern themselves, and therefore --'
He started and almost cried out. A pang of pain had shot through his body. O'Brien had pushed the lever of the dial up to thirty-five.
'That was stupid, Winston, stupid!' he said. 'You should know better than to say a thing like that.'
He pulled the lever back and continued:
'Now I will tell you the answer to my question. It is this. The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or happiness: only power, pure power. What pure power means you will understand presently. We are different from all the oligarchies of the past, in that we know what we are doing. All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they never had the courage to recognize their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just round the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal. We are not like that. We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?'
This isn't much, but imagine for a moment that this was under Bill Clinton (and quite a bit of what became the PATRIOT Act was written during his tenure) with Janet Reno running the show. People who support this and/or expanding it - they won't regret it, but their grandchildren and their grandchildren will.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.