Posted on 08/21/2013 3:31:36 PM PDT by shego
Earlier this month, Reuters revealed that a special division within the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has been using intelligence intercepts, wiretaps, informants and a mass database of telephone records to secretly identify targets for drug enforcement actions.In the wake of these revelations, a former prosecutor tells IPS he believes he and his colleagues may have been unwitting pawns in the federal government's effort to deceive defendants and the court system, thereby violating citizens' constitutional rights.
"None of us had any idea whatsoever there was a secret DEA programme that instructed DEA agents to conceal the source," Patrick Nightingale, a former prosecutor for Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, and a member of Law Enforcement Against Prohibition, told IPS.
"My oath as an attorney and as a prosecutor was as an officer of the constitution, and not to win at all costs. This [programme] is a win at all costs mentality: whether it's constitutional or not we're going to use it..."
Called the Special Operations Division (SOD), it is comprised of some two dozen federal agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency (NSA), Internal Revenue Service (IRS), and the Department of Homeland Security.
Everything about the SOD is secret, including the size of its budget and the location of its offices....
As a routine practice, the SOD secretly provides the information to local authorities across the U.S., allowing them to start investigations against U.S. citizens under false pretenses, in a practice known as "parallel construction".
For example, under parallel construction, local law enforcement will be instructed to find a reason to stop a particular vehicle--for example, through a routine traffic stop--and then once the drugs are found, the government will falsely state the drugs were found in the traffic stop....
(Excerpt) Read more at international.to ...
The guys in Stasi could only dream of the tools we are giving our future oppressors.
Evidence laundering.
If Bush had done this, the msm would be on it like white on rice. I don’t understand how they ALL can ignore it when the terrorist in the WH does it.
Nope, earlier than that.
1938 or thereabouts..
Any government big enough to give you everything you want.....
'True believers' on the other side are starting to have doubts... Then again the monster-wannabees will deal with them harshly... Might be interesting.
IOKIYAD (It's OK If You're A Democrat).
Conspiracy Theory? This seems to be pretty well backed up by facts....
Saying things that two generations ago would have earned one a stay at the State Home for the Bewildered, that a generation ago would have garnered laughter and ridicule, that even ten years ago would have gotten a grin and perhaps, just perhaps, a thoughtful look, those things that now are on the front page or buried in section 3, and that make observant and aware people to cringe, look over their shoulders and speak only in whispers.
I shout those things from the rooftops.
This is an appalling abuse of authority, and inherently a violation of the 4th Amendment.
However, this sort of abuse has been going on ever since the PATRIOT Act. Remember when John Ashcroft use the PATRIOT Act powers to roll up a strip club in Vegas and to bust prostitutes in New Orleans?
I hold no brief for Obama or prostitutes generally, but wish only to point out that the Bill of Rights has been a dead letter for quite some time.
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.