Law enforcement agencies don't know how often their informants commit crimes.
Washington, D. C. - The nation's top drug and gun enforcement agencies do not track how often they give their informants permission to break the law on the government's behalf.
U.S. Justice Department rules put strict limits on when and how agents at the FBI, Drug Enforcement Administration and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives can authorize their informants — often drawn from the ranks of the criminals they are investigating — to commit a crime. But both the ATF and DEA acknowledged, in response to open-records requests and in written statements, that they do not track how often such permission is given.
That routine, if controversial, tactic has come under renewed scrutiny in the wake of the bungled "Fast and Furious" gun-trafficking investigation, which allowed 2,000 weapons to fall into the hands of Mexican drug cartels and other criminals. A report by the Justice Department's Inspector General found that ATF agents failed to get authorization from their superiors before they allowed gun dealers to sell weapons to suspected cartel operatives.
The report, delivered in September, is the latest internal probe to find agents ignoring the rules. And the department continues to face accusations that its agents overlook crimes by their informants, including one case this year involving an alleged Boston mob captain who was working for the FBI.
"The way we use confidential informants is a huge aspect of the daily operation and also the legitimacy of the criminal justice system," said Alexandra Natapoff, a professor at Loyola Law School Los Angeles. "It's insane that even the law enforcement agencies that actually carry out this policy may not always know how their operatives are doing it."
The ATF and DEA said in written statements that they are "in compliance'' with the rules for using informants, and that information about crimes by individual informants is "collected at both the field division and headquarters levels." The rules do not require the agencies to tally authorizations to engage in what the department calls "otherwise illegal activity" to determine how often it happens.
The FBI, by comparison, is required to collect information on how often each of the bureau's 56 field offices allows informants to break the law, though the bureau would not release those figures. (The FBI initially said in response to a request by USA TODAY that it, too, had no reports that would indicate how often informants are allowed to commit crimes.)
"There has to be some new accountability," said Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-Mass., who introduced a bill last year to force federal law enforcement agencies to tell Congress about crimes by their informants. "There can be a big upside when informants are used and the FBI actually pulls bad people off the street. But no one is looking at the collateral damage."
Informants' work is a closely guarded secret, in large part because of the danger involved. But records suggest the government's network of cooperators is vast: In 2005, the DEA estimated it had 4,000 informants, and two years later the FBI said in a budget request that its agents had 15,000 more. DEA officials told the inspector general's office that "without confidential sources, the DEA could not effectively enforce the controlled substances laws of the United States."
As part of that work, agents have authorized their informants to do everything from buying and selling drugs to participating in Medicaid fraud rings. Agents are supposed to get supervisors' approval before they permit informants to commit even minor crimes; in more serious cases — involving violence or big drug shipments — they must also get permission from Justice Department lawyers.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2012/10/07/informants-justice-crime/1600323/
ICE used her as bait, teen-ager says.
Tuscon, AZ - - Border patrol officers coerced a teen-age Guatemalan girl into being bait in a sting against human smugglers, then shot at a vehicle in which they knew she was riding, and it crashed, the young woman claims in Federal Court.
Jane Doe sued the United States and unknown agents of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and/or U.S. Customs and Border Protection.
She claims the border patrolmen threatened to deport her to El Salvador, told her she would have blood on her hands if she refused to help them, and promised she could stay in the United States if all went well.
But all did not go well, she said, and now she suffers from intense pain and constant fear.
Doe says she was 17 when she fled an abusive home in rural Guatemala in 2009 to join her mother and father in the United States. Her father had hired a coyote, or human smuggler, to take her and her younger sister overland through Mexico to Arizona.
Doe says she became separated from her group and wandered in the wilderness for two nights before being picked up by Border Patrol and/or ICE agents. She says the agents pressured her into "playing the lead role in a dangerous sting operation."
"To do so, the agents put plaintiff under intense pressure," the complaint states. "They refused her requests to speak to family members, whom they told plaintiff were also in their custody, unless she first took part in the sting operation. The agents also threatened to send plaintiff to El Salvador, a country to which she has no connection. The agents emphasized that the coyotes were responsible for deaths of other immigrants - in effect telling plaintiff that she would have blood on her hands if she did not take part in the sting operation.
They also promised plaintiff that she would be allowed to remain in the U.S. if she assisted them. Under this pressure, plaintiff believed that she had no choice but to participate in the sting operation."
Read more: http://www.courthousenews.com/2012/10/12/51231.htm