The Pennsylvania homeland security office engaged in domestic surveillance of citizens. Is the Institute of Terrorism Research and Response, a private intelligence contractor to blame?
The Institute of Terrorism Research and Response, what possible reason would a private company have to fabricate false stories and conduct surveillance on U. S. citizens? Drumming up business and trampling over our bill of rights is not a concern in their pursuit of profits.
The Patriot-News reported that Pennsylvania’s Office of Homeland Security had been tracking groups engaged in lawful, peaceful protests, including groups opposed to natural gas drilling, peace activists and gay rights groups. An embarrassed Gov. Ed Rendell, who said that he had been unaware of the program until he read the newspaper, issued an immediate order to halt it.
It turns out the homeland security office or its private consultant were doing more than just monitoring law-abiding citizens.
They were comparing environmental activists to Al-Qaeda.
They were tracking down protesters and grilling their parents.
They were seeking a network of citizen spies to combat the security threats they saw in virtually any legal political activity.
And they were feeding their suspicions not only to law enforcement, but to dozens of private businesses from natural gas drillers to The Hershey Co.
Internal emails from the Homeland Security office reveal a determined effort to recruit local people receiving its intelligence bulletins municipal police chiefs, county sheriffs, local emergency management personnel into its network of citizen spies.
The goal was to get those locals to start feeding information to the Institute of Terrorism Research and Response, a private “intelligence” contractor working with the state’s Homeland Security office.
In an email to ITRR in June, former OHS Director James Powers explains, “Thus far, we’ve pushed information to the customer and haven’t actually requested feedback regarding the sites/cities mentioned” in the bulletins.
“We’re not looking for them to dump everything on us that occurs in their jurisdiction,” he writes, “only that which relates to the critical infrastructure. In turn, we’ll provide it to you for the analysts to review and make further findings.”
However, the definition of “critical infrastructure” employed by Powers and ITRR was clearly very broad. The bulletins were, in fact, loaded with information about legal and peaceful activities by activist groups of all political persuasions.
ITRR continues to monitor law-abiding citizens for its corporate clients
Links: http://www.terrorresponse.org/
http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2010/11/pennsylvania_homeland_security_1.html