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| For Immediate Release | |
| Sep 11, 2002 | Contact: Press
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Agents Lied To Federal Court for Wiretap Authority and Compromised Criminal Investigations of Terrorists FBI Headquarters’ International Terrorism Unit Acted as a “Spectator” While Americans Died at the Hands of Terrorists (Washington, DC) Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption and abuse, represents “whistleblowing” FBI Special Agent (SA) Robert G. Wright, Jr., of the bureau’s Chicago Division, who said today that the FBI continues to dodge accountability and cover-up its negligence and dereliction of duty in pursuing terrorists who pose a direct threat to the United States. SA Wright is the only FBI agent to seize terrorist funds (over $1.4 million) from U.S.-based Middle Eastern terrorists using federal civil forfeiture statutes, prior to the September 11th attacks. The original source of the funds was Yassin Kadi, a Saudi businessman, who is reportedly a financier of Osama bin Laden. SA Wright points to recent misconduct and falsifications of wiretap warrant applications by FBI agents (signed-off by the former FBI Director, Louis Freeh) to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court. Prior to September 11th, SA Wright alleged FBI intelligence agents lied and hid vital records from criminal agents for the purpose of obstructing his criminal investigation of the terrorists in order to protect their “subjects,” and prolong their intelligence operations. SA Wright was stunned to learn recently that some of the FBI intelligence agents that had stalled and obstructed his criminal investigations of terrorists in Chicago had also lied to the judges of the FISA Court in Washington, DC. SA Wright says that, in his opinion, prior to September 11th, the ITU’s incompetence and repeated failures to support criminal investigations contributed directly to the deaths of five Americans. The ITU’s absolute failure to detect and identify the September 11th terrorist plot, and the radical Islamists that carried it out, is further evidence of the ITU’s negligence, and places the deaths of thousands of Americans at their door. Over the last year, SA Wright has repeatedly tried to lawfully expose the FBI’s incompetence and dereliction: 1) through FBI and Justice Department channels, 2) through individual Congressmen and Senators, 3) to the Joint Congressional Intelligence Committee and, 4) at a press conference held by his legal counsel, Larry Klayman, the Chairman of Judicial Watch, Inc., and co-counsel, David Schippers, Esq., of Schippers and Bailey of Chicago, IL. The FBI continues to illegally refuse the release of SA Wright’s 500 page manuscript, Fatal Betrayals of the Intelligence Mission, that SA Wright submitted for prepublication review in October 2001. In fact, the FBI refused to turn the manuscript over to Sen. Richard C. Shelby, Vice Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Commitee, charged with investigating the FBI’s intelligence failures. The FBI falsely claims that the manuscript contains grand jury material, although SA Wright has publicly available, “open source,” references for all of the material in the manuscript. Schippers, a former federal prosecutor, has suggested that the committee petition U.S. District Court Chief Judge Charles P. Kocoras to disclose any such grand jury material under Criminal Rule 6(e)(3)(D), as matter involving intelligence and counterintelligence. In anticipation of being subpoenaed by the Joint Intelligence Committee, SA Wright has prepared a statement detailing the FBI’s negligence and dereliction of duty in pursuing the terrorist threat to the American public. “SA Wright is performing a service for his country by exposing the FBI’s dereliction of duty – particularly by FBI headquarters staffers. Director Mueller survived the ‘bad press’ of last May, and the nation’s attention has moved on to something else – until the next terrorist attack. How many more dead Americans will it take to get accountability from the FBI?,” stated Judicial Watch Chairman and General Counsel Larry Klayman. Judicial Watch’s new book, Fatal Neglect: The U.S. Government’s Continuing Failure to Protect American Citizens from Terrorists, details FBI and other government incompetence that leaves American citizens exposed to terrorism. Click here for the book. info@judicialwatch.org •
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