Canadian Judge Tosses Case After Finding Law Enforcement Entrapped Supposed Terrorists
from the but-for-the-grace-of-untargeted,-overbudgeted-law-enforcement-agencies-go-we dept
It's not just FBI agents playing with Home-Grown Terrorist™ Erector Sets. It's also Canada's top law enforcement agency, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. When there apparently aren't enough actual terrorists to be found, agencies like these need to front the $40 at Wal-Mart for terrorist supplies, or dupe someone with an IQ of 51 into becoming the latest Indictment Du Jour.
Despite this, courts have largely gone along with the charade. It's almost impossible for someone to successfully raise an entrapment defense, whether it's a group of senior citizens who've been molded by undercover agents into an ad hoc terror unit or a bunch of easily-impressed thugs being hounded into stealing nonexistent drugs from fake stash houses.
Up in Canada, though, the law enforcement game may be played by the same rules, but one court isn't willing to encourage the RCMP's Build-a-Terrorist shenanigans.
A British Columbia couple convicted of terrorism charges have had their verdicts tossed out in a scathing court decision that flays the RCMP for its “egregious” conduct in manipulating naive suspects into carrying out a police-manufactured crime.
[...]
B.C. Supreme Court Justice Catherine Bruce said the Mounties used trickery, deceit and veiled threats to engineer the terrorist acts for which Nuttall and Korody were arrested on Canada Day three years ago.
The RCMP, like its US equivalent, only seeks the best of the best when attempting to turn citizens into terrorists. In this case, the RCMP found two easy marks -- both heavily dependent on welfare checks and methadone -- and convinced them they were going to be involved in a revolutionary pressure cooker bombing at some point in the future.
Judge Bruce noted that the two suspects contributed almost nothing to the RCMP's plan. In fact, the judge stated that without the RCMP's incredible amount of assistance, any plans to bomb anything likely would never have materialized. The indicted pair weren't exactly self-starters, and the RCMP's undercover agent basically had to act like a maniacal cult leader to get them to do anything at all.
She also condemned the behaviour of the primary undercover officer who, at the direction of the operation’s overseers, discouraged Nuttall and Korody from seeking outside spiritual guidance and convinced them he was a member of a powerful international terrorist group that would likely kill them if they failed to follow through.
“He was their leader and they were his disciples,” said Bruce, who stayed the proceedings, which threw out the convictions and allowed the couple to walk free after more than three years behind bars.
The government is appealing the decision and still firmly believes that the only party that did anything wrong here were the methadone users who hardly did anything. And for their minimal contributions to the RCMP's master plan, the Crown is hoping to get a second chance at putting these two away for the rest of their lives.
Judge Bruce's statement when tossing the charges should be repeated on this side of the border, where the FBI seems to expend a majority of its anti-terrorism time and energy pushing reluctant, inept, mostly-incapable people into becoming the bumbling, sacrificial figureheads of ISIS: West.
“The world has enough terrorists. We do not need the police to create more.”
There appears to be no shortage of legitimate (so to speak…) criminal activity for law enforcement to pursue and investigate. And yet, given the choice, they'd rather craft both criminals and criminal activity from the ground up, scoring easy goals against unguarded nets -- making the world a little less safe while ensuring their budgets are never endangered.
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Filed Under: canada, entrapment, own plot, rcmp, terrorism
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"We just told them they'd be killed if they didn't obey, what's wrong with that?"
Funny, I imagine that if anyone without a badge had told someone that they either did X or they'd be killed the one who made the threat would be facing charges, rather than the one on the receiving end of it.
That bit alone should have been more than enough to completely gut any possible charges against them, the fact that the government is still pushing for charges just shows how desperate they are to rack up another 'win', no matter the cost.
While it's nice that the judge tossed the case, and hopefully it stays dead, cons like this will continue to happen for so long as those involved receive no punishment. Worst case scenario for the government at this point? They don't get to add another notch on the 'terrorists' busted list.
If those involved were looking at charges themselves then they might reign in their actions, but until that point the cost/gain analysis is entirely one sided where they have everything to gain, and absolutely nothing to lose, so why not throw the foolish, the desperate or the stupid into the meatgrinder just to score some easy 'wins'?
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Re: "We just told them they'd be killed if they didn't obey, what's wrong with that?"
In that circumstance it would be both just and bitter dark comedy if the terrorist-builders ended up facing charges as well in that circumstance.
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R. v. Nuttall
Opinion in R v Nutall (BCSC, July 29, 2016).
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This tactic is an ancient and time honored trick on the unwashed masses of fools and cowards.
It also works fucking damn good too!
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Arent You Glad This Could Never Happen In Teh USA
Those who Hate us, only Hate us for our Freedoms!
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Dudley Do-Right...?
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Wasn't it in Federalist that the courts were described as being the weakest of the branches because they could only interpret the law - they couldn't make law, they didn't have anyone to enforce their decisions.
Admittedly, that principle has gone by the wayside today, but I dare say it might be a smart idea to dust it off and reapply it to both the courts and the cops.
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Weakest? They have never been the weakest. They do have people to enforce their decisions and interpreting law is effectively creating it... the trick is that they need a victim placed in their sights by law enforcement.
Once a victim is in the court system... they can be mercilessly fucked in ways the other "stronger branches" never can.
Never again make the mistake of claiming any branch of government is the weaker one just because one has been flexing more or less than the other recently!
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But they know they cant simply do that without making the fucking severe lack of respect for human rights obvious........which is why fear mongering is good......for them
Life is hard, its unfair, its unforgiven......but ill be fucked if im just gonna lie meekly down and, at least, not,take fucking notice of the people taking advantage of something as a species we have to overcome ourselves, let alone fanning the damn flames
We the conditioned, who have to be told what is right or wrong, instead of we the people who do unto others that which you would want done unto you, your, our, instinctual rights.........natures right..........why does the gazzelle not simply wait for the cheetah to catch him
Its not HUMAN right, its EARTHS right, its NATURES right.......one, many people in our histories have attempted to transfer into words, ink, law
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“The world has enough terrorists. We do not need the police to create more.”
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Maybe this is more about paid officials enjoying creating terror than making false flags.
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Terrorists, Terrorists Everywhere but Nary a Plot to Uncover
In order for Judge Bruce's statement to be repeated in the US the pliably supine court jesters genuflecting to the US national security state would need to grow a spine and actually uphold the law and put an end to FBI's terrorist entrapment schemes.
The Guardian 2011:
Fake terror plots, paid informants: the tactics of FBI 'entrapment' questioned
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/nov/16/fbi-entrapment-fake-terror-plots
Rolling Stone article from 2012:
How FBI Entrapment Is Inventing 'Terrorists' - and Letting Bad Guys Off the Hook
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/how-fbi-entrapment-is-inventing-terrorists-and-letting -bad-guys-off-the-hook-20120515
The Intercept from 2015:
Why Does the FBI Have to Manufacture its Own Plots if Terrorism and ISIS Are Such Grave Threats?
https://theintercept.com/2015/02/26/fbi-manufacture-plots-terrorism-isis-grave-threats/
The worthless propaganda rag known as the New York Times from 2016:
F.B.I. Steps Up Use of Stings in ISIS Cases
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/08/us/fbi-isis-terrorism-stings.html?_r=0
Fear is a very useful tool in the hands of authoritarian control freaks in government. When people are placed in a perpetual state of fear 24/7/365 they're more likely to willingly surrender their liberties/rights and accept the lies that government, through it's propagandists, puts forth as the unmitigated "truth".
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