A Corrupt FBI Let Mobster Whitey Bulger Keep Killing

You’d hardly know it from the wall-to-wall coverage of the George Zimmerman case, but there’s another trial going on that’s at least as worthy of national attention. That’s the 32-count federal racketeering indictment against James “Whitey” Bulger, a Boston mob kingpin linked to at least 19 murders, captured in 2011…

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More About FBI Spying

The FBI has a long history of abusing its national security surveillance powers. The potential for abuse is once again great, particularly given that the lines between criminal investigations and foreign intelligence operations have been blurred or erased since 9/11. As a result, intrusive surveillance tools originally developed to target…

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FBI Free To Ambush Our Bill Of Rights

When I was a kid, beginning to learn what it is to be an American, I found a hero in George Mason, a leading Virginia delegate to the 1787 Constitutional Convention. Mason refused to sign on to the Constitution that was passed by the convention. Why? “There is no Declaration…

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National Security And A Less-Restrained FBI

Less than three years after the last major revision of its domestic surveillance guidelines, the FBI is preparing to loosen its restrictions on monitoring Americans. If this is not halted, we might find our privacy eroded beyond repair. Agents are already free to search the public Internet and the federal…

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Timothy Lynch Reviews The FBI’s First 100 years.

In 1908, the Justice Department created the Bureau of Investigation, a small division of detectives that was responsible for investigating violations of federal law. The division was filled with incompetent and corrupt agents until a young bureaucrat by the name of J. Edgar Hoover was brought in to clean house….

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Why We Don’t Trust The FBI

In July 2005 when there was a terrorist bombing in the London subway system the FBI, using a perfectly valid and legal subpoena, asked for and obtained documents from North Carolina State University about a possible conspirator. That apparently wasn’t good enough for the FBI. They wanted the agent to…

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FBI Misuses And Under Reports Patriot Act Audit

The FBI evaded limits on, and sometimes illegally issued, orders for phone, email and financial information on American citizens and underreported the use of these self-issued orders to Congress, according to an internal audit by the Justice Department released Friday. The DOJ Inspector General reported that the FBI used self-issued…

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Greed And Corruption: An FBI Agent Gone Bad

Daniel Mitrione traded the integrity of his FBI shield for a fast boat, fashionable clothes, luxury houses, expensive trips and 20 bars of silver. His story is that of the erosion of principle by greed and corruption. Mitrione’s partner in a nine-month FBI undercover operation was Hilmer B. Sandini, 60,…

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