FC: AP's Ted Bridis on illegal FBI surveillance, videotaping

From: Declan McCullagh (declanat_private)
Date: Fri Oct 11 2002 - 08:09:19 PDT

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    Washington Post's coverage:
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3704-2002Oct9.html
    
    ---
    
    From: "Ted Bridis" <tbridisat_private>
    To: <declanat_private>
    Subject: FISA
    Date: Thu, 10 Oct 2002 14:47:52 -0400
    Organization: The Associated Press
    
    	THE WHITE HOUSE REGULAR BRIEFING BRIEFER: ARI FLEISCHER, WHITE
    HOUSE
       SPOKESMAN LOCATION: WHITE HOUSE BRIEFING ROOM, WASHINGTON, D.C. TIME:
    12:53
       P.M. EDT DATE: THURSDAY, OCTOBER 10, 2002
    
           Q     The FISA court chastised the FBI for misrepresenting a lot
      of what they are doing with, wiretaps, et cetera.  There were 75
      occurrences.  Now there is a memo that has -- has been -- has in
      Congress.  And the question is, the president meets with the FBI
      pretty much every day.  Has he decided to take an active interest in
      this, or is he going to take an active interest in some of the
      overreaches of the FBI?
    
           MR. FLEISCHER:  The president has made it clear -- and he
      believes the FBI is doing this -- about the importance of doing two
      things and doing them well.  One is protecting the American people
      from the risks that we face from terrorists who would use our open
      system to come here and bring harm to people; and secondly, to do it
      within the Constitution because it's the Constitution, after all, that
      fundamentally gives us our greatest protections.  And that is the
      challenge that law enforcement faces at all times.  And the president
      is confident the FBI is doing it well.
    
    http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/doj/fisa/ec.pdf
    
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A2121-2002Oct9.html
    
    http://www.newseum.org/media/dfp/pdf/NV_LVRJ.pdf
    
    FBI Memo Details Pre-9/11 Sloppiness
    
    By Ted Bridis
    Associated Press Writer
    Wednesday, October 9, 2002; 4:50 PM
    
    WASHINGTON -- FBI agents illegally videotaped suspects, intercepted
    e-mails without court permission and recorded the wrong phone
    conversations during sensitive terrorism and espionage investigations,
    according to an internal memorandum detailing serious lapses inside the
    FBI more than a year before the Sept. 11 attacks.
    
    The blunders - roughly 15 over the first three months of 2000 - were
    never made public but garnered the attention of the "highest levels of
    management" inside FBI, said the memo written by senior bureau lawyers
    and obtained by The Associated Press.
    
    Lawmakers reviewing FBI missteps preceding the terror attacks expressed
    surprise Wednesday at the extent of errors detailed in the memo, which
    focused on sensitive cases requiring warrants under the Foreign
    Intelligence Surveillance Act.
    
    The mistakes extend beyond those criticized in a rare public decision
    this summer by the secretive U.S. court that oversees the surveillance
    warrants. That court admonished the FBI for providing inaccurate
    information in warrant applications.
    
    The April 2000 memo - marked "immediate" and classified as "secret" -
    describes different problems from those cited by the court. It describes
    agents conducting unauthorized searches, writing warrants with wrong
    addresses and allowing "overruns" of electronic surveillance operations
    beyond their legal deadline.
    
    "The level of incompetence here is egregious," said Rep. William D.
    Delahunt, D-Mass., a member of the House Judiciary Committee who
    obtained the memo from the FBI and provided it to AP.
    
    [...]
    
    
    
    
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