Prenda's Paul Hansmeier Now Under FBI Investigation For His ADA Lawsuits

from the lawyer-working-on-fraud-hat-trick dept

The wheels of justice have turned to the point where Team Prenda copyright trolling efforts have netted John Steele and Paul Hansmeier federal indictments. The list of charges the pair face is ugly: mail fraud, wire fraud, conspiracy to commit money laundering, and suborning perjury.

After Prenda's many copyright lawsuits fell apart, Paul Hansmeier decided to start trolling small, local businesses with ADA lawsuits, hoping to turn what little legal expertise he has into profitable settlements. During this time, Hansmeier was also facing the dismantling of an attempted bankruptcy filing -- one that very much looked like an attempt to avoid paying judgments resulting from Prenda's years of bullshit. To avoid having his assets turned over to creditors, Hansmeier engaged in some creative accounting, like handing off money to a newly-formed trust and... dumping cash into a cardboard box.

Hansmeier's ADA lawsuits weren't particularly successful and his efforts were beginning to attract judicial scrutiny. Worse, it appears the lawsuits have also attracted the attention of the FBI, which means Hansmeier could soon be facing a second set of indictments.

Jennifer L. Urban, an attorney for DSA [Disability Support Alliance], said in court filings that the nonprofit was a victim of a crime perpetrated by Smith and Hansmeier, his former attorney.

Urban wrote that the DSA filed criminal complaints with the Burnsville Police Department against Smith and another former DSA director, Aaron Dalton, over a series of cash withdrawals earlier this year. A Burnsville detective helped DSA retrieve $4,400 that Dalton was captured on camera taking out of an ATM but was unable to recover $6,900 withdrawn by Smith, Urban said.

The FBI, meanwhile, notified Urban in October that DSA was a possible victim of a federal crime. She wrote Wednesday that DSA is “cooperating with the ongoing federal criminal investigation/prosecution of Paul Hansmeier.”

During the short period Hansmeier was in the ADA trolling business, he filed nearly 100 lawsuits against Minnesota small businesses. Some settlements were obtained, but not nearly as many as Hansmeier would have hoped. His law license was suspended this fall, which meant his trolling efforts have to continue without his assistance. Someone who helped Hansmeier hide money from creditors is now the new face of Minnesota ADA trolling.

His wife, Padraigin Browne, picked up his pending disability access lawsuits — including the CCRE federal suit — and has since filed a number of her own.

Apparently, Hansmeier has more cash on hand -- and has helped others similarly situated in the ADA trolling business.

DSA Board Chair Eric Wong hired Urban’s firm late last year, partly to investigate suspected internal theft. The investigation revealed the theft by Smith and Dalton but also that Hansmeier helped four DSA directors — Smith, Dalton, Zachary Hillesheim and Melanie Davis — steal settlement proceeds from litigation efforts, according to Urban.

She said the investigation also revealed that Hansmeier got $312,218 — more than 70 percent of the revenue generated by DSA litigation — from July 2014 to June 2016 despite never litigating a case to a verdict and being awarded attorney’s fees or invoicing DSA for payment.

A letter [PDF] from the FBI to Jennifer Urban of the DSA confirms the investigation. The letter informs her of her rights as a victim and cautions that investigations are often lengthy and not easily resolved. But the good news is that another set of justice wheels are grinding, however slowly. And at the end of the grind is a lawyer who never found a way to turn his law degree into an honest living.

Filed Under: ada, ada troll, copyright troll, fbi, investigation, paul hansmeier

FOIA Requesters Sue Government Agencies Over Non-Responses To Requests For Election-Related Documents

from the and-this-is-how-the-public-alters-the-FOIA-response-timetable dept

Two of the nation's foremost FOIA enthusiasts -- Jason Leopold and Ryan Shapiro -- are suing a variety of federal agencies for their failure to respond to requests for documents related to the 2016 election.

The first lawsuit, filed a couple of weeks ago, concerns records pertaining to FBI director James Comey's actions in the last few weeks before Election Day. Most of the documents sought relate to the FBI's on-again, off-again investigation into Hillary Clinton's private email server. The pair also seeks a variety of communications between Comey and the rest of the FBI, as well as any internal FBI discussions about the number of leaks that accompanied Comey's last-minute dive back into the email investigation.

Shapiro and Leopold are also seeking unredacted copies of Clinton email investigation documents previously released by the FBI. They also would like to see what the FBI has on hand that references a variety of right-wing news sites, including Breitbart News and alternativeright.com.

The first lawsuit [PDF] alleges the FBI has violated FOIA law by not responding to their expedited request in a timely fashion. At the date of the lawsuit's filing, the FBI had yet to inform the requesters whether or not it would grant the request expedited status.

The second lawsuit [PDF], filed earlier this week, makes the same allegations. Expedited processing was requested, but the agencies targeted failed to rule on the processing request in a timely fashion. The list of defendants in this lawsuit is a bit longer. Shapiro and Leopold have requested election-related documents from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, CIA, DOJ, and DHS. None of these agencies have issued a ruling on expedited processing.

The documents sought here are also a bit different. The two requesters are asking for documents held by these agencies that pertain to the Russian interference -- hacking or otherwise -- in the electoral process. There are some interesting keywords listed, including Guccifer, Elite VPN, two IP addresses, and anything related to the alleged compromise of Clinton campaign head John Podesta's devices/email accounts.

Obviously, both of the requests being sued over are time-sensitive and of considerable public interest. The longer these agencies delay their responses, the less "interesting" the information is to the public. Pulling the trigger on lawsuits two weeks after FOIA requests are filed is the new way of playing ball with federal agencies. Left to their own timetables, the agencies would likely release these documents sometime between "the distant future" and "never." This prompts the parties listed to at least adhere to the letter of the law and make a determination on expedited processing. And, given the information sought, there's no way these will be the only FOIA lawsuits related to the requested documents.

Filed Under: cia, dhs, doj, election, fbi, foia, hillary clinton, investigation, james comey, jason leopold, lawsuit, odni, russia, ryan shapiro

Unsealed Clinton Email Warrant Asks Court To Maintain Secrecy Of Investigation James Comey Publicly Announced To Congress

from the in-all-things,-boilerplate dept

The FBI's search warrant for Anthony Weiner's laptop was unsealed and released yesterday. This isn't the warrant the FBI originally used to seize and search the laptop. That one was looking for evidence related to allegations Weiner sexted an underage girl.

This warrant is the second search warrant for the same laptop, related to the discovery of emails to and from Hillary Clinton on it. This discovery during an unrelated search prompted Comey to write a letter to Congress informing it that he was going to be diving back into the Clinton email investigation.

The second dive into emails stored on the laptop by former Clinton aide (and estranged spouse of Anthony Weiner) Huma Abedin resulted in the discovery of nothing the FBI hadn't already seen. Comey apologized for getting everyone hot and bothered by his shouting of "CLASSIFIED!" in a crowded electoral season, but believed his actions were justified because he feared this information would likely leak anyway.

Leaks did abound, but the emails found on the laptop were ones that had already been seen by the FBI during its earlier investigation. Since no charges are being brought against Clinton (or Abedin) for mishandling of classified information, there's likely going to be no Fourth Amendment challenges raised in regards to the evidence the FBI didn't find.

If for some reason there was, I'm sure the FBI would feel the "plain view" exception (or perhaps "inevitable discovery," although plain view is a more accurate description...) would apply to its discovery of possible evidence completely unrelated to the Weiner sexting investigation at hand. As the affidavit explains, the normal process of going through emails for the Weiner investigation resulted in the viewing of email header info pointing to Hillary Clinton's private email server.

Having "segregated" those emails, the FBI applied for a second warrant [PDF] to search the content of those communications for classified material. As we know now, nothing of interest was found. Still, there was only the minimum of probable cause to search the content of these stored emails: that Hillary Clinton's email address appeared in the header info. This small possibility the seized emails may have contained classified information was used to justify a second forensic imaging of the seized laptop.

What's completely ridiculous about the affidavit is the agent's request that the affidavit and warrant be sealed because of the "confidential nature" of the investigation. Never mind the fact that James Comey himself blew past other FBI officials' recommendations and outed the results of the first investigation in a public press conference. Then he did it again with his letter to Congress on October 28 -- two days BEFORE this FBI agent asked for the sealing of documents because the investigation was apparently too "sensitive" to be made public.

It could be the agent prepared this affidavit before Comey decided to go public with his announcement, but the signature and date of October 30th appear directly below this paragraph claiming this information needed to be withheld from the public. And the judge granted it, which is just as much of an absurdity. It's not as though no one was aware of Comey's announcement. It was literally in all the papers. But, hey, law enforcement loves boilerplate and, apparently, magistrates' eyes start glossing over by the time they get to affidavit signature pages, because no one thought this request might sound ridiculous given the circumstances surrounding it.

Filed Under: anthony weiner, doj, emails, fbi, hillary clinton, huma abedin, investigation, james comey, probable cause, secrecy, warrant

FBI Investigates Journalist For An Obvious Joke Tweet, Because What The Hell Is Wrong With The FBI?

from the and-they-want-access-to-our-secrets? dept

Here's today's insane story of FBI ridiculousness: the FBI has been investigating an editor at Huffington Post, Nick Baumann, for an obvious joke tweet mocking fake news. Really. To understand what happened, it requires a bit of background, especially if you're not steeped in Twitter culture -- but it's the kind of background that (1) you can pick up quickly and (2) shouldn't confuse an FBI agent... but apparently it did. Still, it requires knowledge of two separate jokes, then a third attempt at a joke... and general knowledge that the FBI doesn't seem to get jokes. Especially Twitter jokes.

First, you have to understand that there's a thing called Weird Twitter, which is... basically what it sounds like. It's more or less a group of Twitter users who post a variety of absurd or silly things, often (though not always) from accounts not naming the actual user. There's a sort of silly, but dry, sense of humor in these tweets, and unless you follow it closely, you might not always get the humor of it. Even if you are aware of it, you might not get the humor of it. But it's generally people coming up with silly tweets, some of which kick off more viral memes. Back in October, Weird Twitter person "raandy" or "@randygdub" kicked off quite a storm by tweeting a joke tweet pretending to work at a Post Office in Ohio, and claiming that he was ripping up absentee ballots of people voting for Trump. Of course, this was back in the day when Trump and his surrogates were insisting that the election was being rigged against him and that there was going to be voter fraud. So, after it made the rounds of Weird Twitter, it left those cozy, joking confines and some Trump supporters picked up on it, believing the tweet was real. Eventually it got onto sites like Gateway Pundit and Drudge Report. Rush Limbaugh mentioned it. It was pretty clearly a joke to people who get Weird Twitter, but once foolish people started taking it seriously, suddenly Ohio's Secretary of State said he was investigating things, and the Postal Service was forced to make a statement: Once people started mocking those who fell for it, lots of people on Twitter started making similar joking tweets, using the phrasing "I love working at [x] in [y] and [doing terrible thing z]"

So, that's joke number one. The second joke involved people passing around totally ridiculous and obviously faked Wikileaks releases claiming extremely silly things related to the conspiracy theories around Hillary Clinton. Perhaps the most well known one -- which also fooled some Trump supporters who retweeted it, was a hilariously obvious fake "Clinton Foundation accounts payable invoice" listing all sorts of groups that conspiracy theorists wanted to tie to the Clinton campaign: Another one was the following one pretending to be from someone associated with Smartmatic voting machines telling Clinton campaign team members that things were all set to program voting machines with some special code with the help of George Soros. This one is playing on another anti-Clinton conspiracy theory (which some people in our comments insisted was true, though it's not), that billionaire George Soros owned a company that was making voting machines that were used in the Presidential election (Soros was a big Clinton backer). The story isn't true. Soros doesn't own the company, and the machines in question weren't used in the election anyway, but... details.

Anyway, that's joke number two.

That finally gets us around to joke number three, which, amazingly, got the FBI's attention. Baumann saw an acquaintance tweet that fake "voting machine" leak (rightly noting that it was fake) and Bauman creatively decided to effectively mix the two jokes into a third joke. A mashup joke, if you will: Get it? Got it. Baumann even explained the joke a little while later in a reply tweet, linking to one of the stories about the silly @RandyGDub tweet after some (notice a trend?) people started believing the joke was real and claiming it was evidence of voting machine tampering.

But apparently, the FBI didn't get the joke. At all. I'll let Baumann explain the next part:

One Twitter user warned that she had reported me to the FBI and to Project Veritas — a right-wing organization led by James O’Keefe that stages elaborate stings of reporters, liberals and others; heavily edits its gotcha videos; and then tries to get those people fired.

Project Veritas did not contact me.

But the FBI decided a journalist’s joke was worth its time.

On Nov. 4, I received a call from someone who said he was an FBI agent and wanted to speak to me. I figured it was a prank. I get a lot of hate emails and angry voicemails, and I dismissed the insane possibility that the FBI would investigate an obvious joke on Twitter. I would’ve called back anyway, just to be sure. But it was right before the election, and I forgot about it.

Then, on Monday, a month later, I received a followup message. It was the same person. It turns out he really is a special agent in the Washington Field Office of the FBI.

“Sorry to bother you,” he said. “The reason I’m calling is — I can’t give you too many details over the phone — we recently received some complaints regarding some online postings that were made. I don’t know if you know what that’s in reference to, but would you be willing to sit down with us for a couple minutes tomorrow morning by chance?”

I couldn’t believe it and started to say so. But he continued, “I know this may sound ridiculous, but when we receive complaints we have to follow them up no matter what.”

As Baumann notes, this isn't actually true. The FBI has every right to ignore totally ridiculous and obviously bogus reports. And, it should. Otherwise it would be way too busy chasing down conspiracy theories. The FBI agent asked to have Baumann come and talk to him, but Baumann rightly notes that when the FBI wants to talk to you, you should shut up and get a lawyer. Baumann went to his employers and got company lawyers involved (given that HuffPo is owned by AOL which is owned by Verizon, you can imagine these are pretty good lawyers).

Baumann notes some further problematic aspects to this investigation -- including that the FBI and DOJ have pretty strict rules about contacting a journalist as part of an investigation (that whole Freedom of the Press thing that the FBI has had some problems with in the past...), and it's pretty clear those rules weren't followed. And, yes, Baumann identifies himself as a journalist in his Twitter bio. And the investigation is not officially over yet, though one hopes the publication of this article gets it closed pretty quickly:

The investigation is ongoing. I hope it goes no further. As Matthew Miller, a former Justice Department spokesman, said, “When you have to guess whether it’s incompetence or something nefarious, it’s usually best to guess incompetence.” But getting a call from an FBI agent investigating you is a big deal.

And, of course, the article ends with this lovely kicker:

On Tuesday, I called @randygdub and asked him whether he had heard from the FBI about his original joke. He laughed and said he hadn’t.

Baumann also notes that he sometimes reports on the FBI, but doesn't think that this is anything nefarious in response to his reporting -- and that's probably true. But it also shows how somewhat random and arbitrary such investigations are -- and what a total waste of time and resources they can be. Is this really the best use of the FBI's time? And if they really "had" to investigate it, that investigation should have started and ended with someone doing at least a tiny bit of online researcher about the jokes in question. It's not that difficult. One would hope that the FBI employs agents who can do a fairly basic Google search before having to call for a meeting over a tweet...

Filed Under: fbi, investigation, jokes, nick baumann, weird twitter

James Comey To Congress: About Those Hillary Clinton Emails I Mentioned Last Week? Meh, Forget About It, Nothing To See

from the wtf,-comey? dept

James Comey continues to be playing by his own ridiculous rules. He was playing by his own rules when he publicly announced that no charges would be sought against Hillary Clinton over her emails back in July. He was playing by his own rules a week ago when he revealed in a letter to Congress that new information had come to light, man. And, he continued to play by his own rules in sending a new letter to Congress saying, "Ooops, turns out there was nothing."

Specifically, the letter -- sent to the same heads of various Congressional committees -- said:

I write to supplement my October 28, 2016 letter that notified you the FBI would be taking additional investigative steps with respect to former Secretary of State Clinton's use of a personal email server. Since my letter, the FBI investigative team has been working around the clock to process and review a large volume of emails from a device obtained in connection with an unrelated criminal investigation. During that process, we reviewed all of the communications that were to or from Hillary Clinton while she was Secretary of State.

Based on our review, we have not changed our conclusions that we expressed in July with respect to Secretary Clinton.

I am very grateful to the professionals at the FBI for doing an extraordinary amount of high-quality work in a short period of time.

Of course, because we're a day out from the election, and everyone wants to see this whole thing through stupid partisan eyes, you have Trump supporters who freaked out over the July announcement, but were thrilled by the October announcement, suddenly pissed off at this latest announcement. A key claim repeated a bunch of times is: "it's not possible the FBI could have gone through 650,000 emails in a week." This ridiculous line of thinking was kicked off by former NYPD Police Commissioner (and convicted felon) Bernard Kerik in a now deleted tweet: Which, of course, is laughably clueless. First of all, there are at least some questions as to whether or not there were actually 650,000 Clinton emails in the bunch, but to do a basic analysis of even that large a group of emails isn't that hard. As some dude named Ed Snowden explained: The key thing here: the crux of the investigation is if any of the emails found via Anthony Weiner/Huma Abedin's devices were different from the ones that the FBI already had from Clinton's server. Doing a basic diff isn't that difficult, as Snowden noted. So, as for Kerik's ridiculous claim, Americans may not be stupid, but it certainly appears that the former NYPD police commissioner is kinda ignorant of how computers work.

That said, going back to the original point: James Comey is and has been ridiculous throughout this process. I know that supporters of both Clinton and Trump have done their flip-flops on whether or not Comey was good or bad based on the July and October announcements, but it should be pretty clear that he was ridiculous throughout this entire process and handled nearly every aspect of it poorly. Even some diehard Trump supporters found the latest move to be dumbfounding. Here's former Congressional Rep. Joe Walsh -- who just a few weeks ago talked about taking up arms if Trump lost -- admitting that Comey's actions are head scratching: So, perhaps -- in the heat of this crazy election that has people screaming at each other -- this is finally an issue that everyone can come together and agree on: James Comey is a terrible FBI director.

Filed Under: anthony weiner, emails, fbi, hillary clinton, huma abedin, investigation, james comey

Canadian Police Use Cell Tower Dumps To Text 7,500 Possible Murder Witnesses

from the new-phone-who-dis dept

Every so often, government entities are efficient despite themselves.

In a move they're describing as "extraordinary" and "unprecedented," Ontario Provincial Police will send text messages to about 7,500 people on Thursday to ask for information about an unsolved homicide.

Investigators are calling it a "digital canvass" — the high-tech equivalent of knocking on thousands of doors for information.

The police are utilizing "dumps" from cell towers in the area to obtain these phone numbers. And that's all they've obtained, apparently. Using the list of connected phones in the area at the time of the murder, the police are sending text messages asking recipients to fill out a website questionnaire to help police find the killer.

As much as this might seem like an intrusion, it's probably preferable to the alternative: sending out dozens of officers to question potentially thousands of witnesses. Obviously, it works out well for the police. But it also works out for citizens. Nothing obliges anyone to respond to the unsolicited texts and answering a few questions on a website is far less annoying than being questioned at home by officers peeking through open doors to see if they can spot anything resembling indicia of criminal activity. Why make the entire day a waste? Why not make a few ancillary arrests while investigating an unrelated crime?

Unfortunately, it appears ignoring the message (or sending back "UNSUBSCRIBE") isn't going to keep the cops from using your phone for their communications.

Investigators will also consider calling the numbers of people who don't respond voluntarily, but they would be required to obtain another court order to do so.

The other troubling aspect is that the police obviously have no interest in destroying the phone data they've collected. It appears this will be held onto until the investigation is closed, even though the majority of the harvested numbers -- if not all of them -- will have zero relevance to the investigation other than their proximity to the crime scene.

The police have stressed that responses are completely voluntary, but the plans for follow-up calls suggest the opposite. On the plus side, if someone doesn't want to speak to a cop, getting removed from the list is as simple as filling out a few questions on a website. No details were provided as to how much personal information respondents will have to turn over, though, so this exercise in government efficiency could become just another data-harvesting method. If not subjected to strict controls, any names collected could be run through criminal record databases in hopes of finding active warrants or unpaid fines. If so, it will be tempting to handle more investigations through tower dumps, text messages, and website questionnaires -- what with all the extra arrests and revenue generation that may result from bulk texting.

Filed Under: canada, investigation, murder, ontario, ontario provincial police, police, privacy, texting, tower dump, witnesses

FBI Boss Blows Past Policies, Guidelines, His Own Staff To Bring Back Clinton Email Investigation

from the marching-to-the-beat-of-his-own-ridiculous-drummer dept

So, months after clearing Hillary Clinton's slate by deciding she was stupid rather than malicious, James Comey has again gone rogue, declaring there's something worth investigating in emails recovered from a sleazy ex-politician's computer. (Thus subverting the norm of recovering emails from a sleazy, CURRENT politician's computer…)

The timing is, of course, suspect. The FBI really isn't supposed to be announcing investigations of presidential candidates this close to Election Day. As Marcy Wheeler points out, there are guidelines Comey appears to be violating.

Jamie Gorelick (who worked with Comey when she was in DOJ) and Larry Thompson (who worked with Comey when Comey was US Attorney and he was Deputy Attorney General, until Comey replaced him) wrote a scathing piece attacking Comey for violating the long-standing prohibition on doing anything in an investigation pertaining to a political candidate in the 60 days leading up to an election.

It's not the law, but it's something. And until Comey decided to merge Weinergate into Emailgate, this guidance has been followed:

Decades ago, the department decided that in the 60-day period before an election, the balance should be struck against even returning indictments involving individuals running for office, as well as against the disclosure of any investigative steps. The reasoning was that, however important it might be for Justice to do its job, and however important it might be for the public to know what Justice knows, because such allegations could not be adjudicated, such actions or disclosures risked undermining the political process. A memorandum reflecting this choice has been issued every four years by multiple attorneys general for a very long time, including in 2016.

It would be a bit much to claim Comey wants to see Trump in the White House. But he apparently has no qualms about violating internal DOJ gentlemen's agreements, which should raise questions -- as Wheeler notes -- about what other policies or guidance Comey considers optional.

The reason you can't put this down as a move meant to damage Clinton's campaign is because that narrative already got used up when Comey refused to recommend prosecution for actions most other government employees wouldn't have walked away from. Suffice it to say, the reaction to Comey's latest announcement depicts partisanship at its best/worst.

So of course the Republicans that had been claiming Comey had corruptly fixed the investigation for Hillary immediately started proclaiming his valor and Democrats that had been pointing confidently to his exoneration of Hillary immediately resumed their criticism of his highly unusual statements on this investigation. Make up your minds, people!

While certain voters sort out their love/hate relationship with James Comey, the next question about broken rules applies to the emails themselves. The FBI seized Anthony Weiner's laptop to search for evidence of alleged communications between Weiner and a 15-year-old. In the course of doing that, agents came across emails between Clinton aides and Huma Abedin, Weiner's estranged wife.

Apparently without knowing the content of these emails, Comey went ahead and decided to alert Congress to the new details of the investigation. Oddly, this happened before the FBI even had a warrant to search those emails -- though it received one over the weekend. Even with the warrant in hand, it's not entirely clear the agency has the right to do that under the Fourth Amendment. The laptop's search and seizure isn't at all related to the (supposedly closed) Hillary Clinton email investigation.

Orin Kerr examines the issues thoroughly at the Volokh Conspiracy. As he sees it, the FBI can't legally expand its investigation for several reasons. Court decisions have suppressed evidence in cases where searches have uncovered evidence of other criminal activity not related to the investigation at hand. These emails are clearly unrelated to the messages sent from Weiner that the FBI was looking for.

The FBI may try to avail itself of the "plain view" exception, but this claim would be dubious at best.

The plain view exception does not allow evidence to be seized outside a warrant unless it is “immediately apparent” upon viewing it that it is evidence of another crime. Just looking quickly at the new evidence, there needs to be probable cause that it is evidence of a second crime to justify its seizure, which would presumably be necessary to apply for the second warrant.

Assuming the FBI hadn't already taken a peek, all that was known about these emails was that they involved a top Clinton aide. There could be no determination at that point that they contained classified or sensitive material. The Fourth Amendment doesn't (or at least shouldn't [stupid courts]) allow communications to be searched first in hopes of justifying the search after coming across some probable cause. The FBI needed to establish that first and it's unclear how it would do it without actually seeing the content -- though the fact that a court granted the warrant raises some questions about why.

Unfortunately, case law is nowhere approaching "settled" on the limits of digital searches. "Plain view" in regards to digital files is much harder to pin down. Some decisions have made it clear the government can't seize devices and look through everything in hopes of finding evidence of other criminal activity. Fishing expeditions are discouraged, but not every court has felt compelled to suppress evidence gathered in this fashion.

However that all shakes out, one thing is clear: James Comey is running the FBI like it's a one-man shop. He's managed to anger other FBI officials with his autonomous decisions and declarations. Marcy Wheeler notes in her post that the DOJ has shown it can't control Comey, and Comey himself -- in his letter to Congress -- suggested that if he didn't come forward with this, someone inside his agency would have leaked the information. So, the DOJ can't control Comey. Comey can't (or won't) control his own people. And Comey will continue to do things his way, no matter what collateral damage he may cause.

Filed Under: 4th amendment, anthony weiner, doj, emails, fbi, hillary clinton, huma abedin, investigation, james comey, warrant

Congressman In Charge Of OPM Hacking Report Announces Plan To Investigate Stingray Use Next

from the a-stingray-sting dept

Representative Jason Chaffetz, fresh off his bombshell report on the OPM hacking, is promising to drop another explosive report in the future. This one will deal with law enforcement's dirty little secret -- one that's not that much of a secret anymore.

The Stingray, a controversial cellphone tracking device used by the U.S. government and law enforcement, will be the subject of a forthcoming investigation from the House Oversight Committee, according to Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah).

"You will be shocked at what the federal government is doing to collect your personal information," Chaffetz said on Wednesday morning. "And they can't keep it secure, that's the point."

It's a good point, one fresh in the mind of millions thanks to the just-delivered OPM report. The government appears willing to take security seriously if it means doling out tax dollars to dozens of agencies with cyberstars in their eyes and crafting bad legislation, but not so much when it comes to actually ensuring its own backyard is locked down.

Chaffetz was one of the legislators behind the 2015 attempt to turn the DOJ's Stingray guidance into law, laying down a warrant requirement for US law enforcement. Unfortunately, the bill went nowhere. Presumably, a thorough investigation into law enforcement use of this repurposed war tech might prompt more legislative cooperation in the future.

Chaffetz has done little to endear himself to security and law enforcement agencies since his arrival on the Hill. In addition to the failed Stingray warrant bill, Chaffetz also partnered with Ron Wyden to attempt to add a warrant requirement for law enforcement GPS tracking -- something the Supreme Court almost addressed in its US v. Jones decision.

He also made new friends with the Secret Service while grilling officials over an incident where drunken agents arrived on the scene of a "suspicious package" report in spectacular fashion, crashing the vehicle they were driving into a White House barricade. Almost as soon as the hearing had begun, Secret Service employees were accessing Chaffetz's personal info (generated by his attempt to join the Secret Service in 2003), hoping to find something embarrassing they could use to discredit him.

This new report will further alienate law enforcement agencies and personnel, starting with the FBI -- which has acted as Stingray Overlord since the introduction of the equipment -- and trickling all the way down to the local level, where agencies have relied on secrecy, lies, and case dismissals to keep information about the cell phone-tracking devices from being made public.

Filed Under: doj, investigation, jason chaffetz, law enforcement, oversight, stingray

University Sues Student Newspaper To Prevent Release Of Sexual Assault Investigation Documents

from the stop-asking,-they-sued dept

Government transparency is once again in default operation mode. If you want the records you're seeking, you're welcome to sue us. Or, in this case, the government is more than happy to sue the requester, if that's what it takes to keep records from being released.

The University of Kentucky is suing its own student newspaper.

This comes after a five-month-long battle between UK and its student newspaper, the Kentucky Kernel, over open records relating to reports of sexual assault and sexual harassment by a university professor.

The student newspaper has asked for copies of investigative documents related to the assault and harassment allegations. The university has refused to hand over the requested documents, claiming doing so would violate the privacy of the accusers. It has continued to withhold the documents despite being told to release them by the state attorney general.

[T]he state attorney general ruled that UK should release the records with the names and personal identifiers of those involved omitted. But the university denied the request on the basis that it would be an invasion of privacy. The refusal is a violation of Kentucky’s Open Records Act, which states the university is not exempt from releasing these records once the investigation is closed…

The Kentucky Kernel isn't seeking to expose personal information. In fact, it already has copies of some of the documents, thanks to an anonymous source. But it's seeking the officially-redacted version from the university. If the school hopes to keep this version out of the student paper's hands, it needs to obtain a ruling that contradicts the state attorney general's decision. Hence the lawsuit, which isn't seeking monetary damages, but rather a declaration that the documents can be withheld in full.

In fact, the university is hoping to keep the documents from ending up anywhere else at all.

A university spokesman, Jay Blanton, told BuzzFeed News Aug. 23 that “Our University cannot — and should not — decide when it is appropriate to violate a victim-survivor’s privacy — and a victim-survivor’s trust — by providing information to the Office of the Attorney General, the Kernel(our student newspaper), or any other entity.”

One has to wonder why the university is so worried about the release of these documents. If it's done nothing wrong, then it has nothing to hide, right? It may be saying things about privacy, but the student newspaper already has a policy in place to withhold personal information about victims of sexual assault. And, once again, the paper is not seeking an unredacted copy that might expose this information if handed over by the school.

So, the excessive secrecy seems to indicate there's something in these documents that might make the school look bad. This could be due to the way it handled the investigation. Or maybe the school protected a staff member for far too long, only choosing to look into allegations once they could no longer be ignored. Whatever the case is, the optics are always bad when a public entity takes a requester to court to thwart an open records request.

Filed Under: foia, investigation, journalism, sexual assault
Companies: university of kentucky

AP Acts As Extension Of Intelligence Community, Claims Section 215 Shutdown Will Hurt Investigation Of Recent Shooting

from the facts-are-irrelevant-when-fear-needs-to-be-sown dept

Over the weekend, the AP's Ted Bridis released a stupid, fearmongering article that disingenously tied the San Bernardino attacks to the expiration of the NSA's Section 215 bulk phone metadata program.

The U.S. government's ability to review and analyze five years' worth of telephone records for the married couple blamed in the deadly shootings in California lapsed just four days earlier when the National Security Agency's controversial mass surveillance program was formally shut down.

Under a court order, those historical calling records at the NSA are now off-limits to agents running the FBI terrorism investigation even with a warrant.

The post -- which runs for several hundred more misleading words -- was immediately attacked online by Marcy Wheeler and others who actually have been paying attention to the details surrounding the 215 program. Ted Bridis and the AP have covered these developments as well, but apparently felt it better to ignore previous knowledge in favor of spewing propaganda-ish ignorance.

Marcy Wheeler, who was unable to get Ted Bridis to admit any errors, much less sneak a few corrections into his asinine article, has a thorough debunking posted at Emptywheel.

[T]he real problem with this utterly erroneous article is that it suggests the “US government” can’t get any records from NSA, which in turn suggests the only records of interest the NSA might have came from the Section 215 dragnet, which is of course nonsense. Not only does the NSA get far more records than what they got under Section 215 — that dragnet was, according to Richard Clarke, just a fraction of what NSA got, and according to NSA’s training, it was significantly redundant with EO 12333 collection on international calls to the US, which the NSA can collect with fewer limits as to format and share more freely with the FBI — but there are plenty of other places where the FBI can get records.

So the AP didn’t mention all the ways FBI gets records on its own, and it didn’t mention the larger NSA EO 12333 bulk collection that NSA can share more freely with FBI.

But the article was useful for some very non-useful idiots. Presidential candidate Marco Rubio was one of the first to retweet the misleading article. Others like him are using this article as a way to push for a rollback of the recently-implemented reform.

The post would have us believe that the FBI won't be able to investigate this thoroughly or uncover future plots because it no longer has access to bulk phone records. This is completely untrue. It also would have us believe that the shutdown of the collection (as it were) will lead to further attacks in the future -- portraying one small (and ultimately expendable) part of the NSA's surveillance apparatus as an insurmountable loss to intelligence gathering.

Politicians with a domestic surveillance ax to grind are using this point to further their views. Rubio is only one of them. Tom Cotton, who tried to block the implementation of the USA Freedom Act, similarly seized the moment (and Ted Bridis' misleading article) to issue more bogus claims about the shutdown of Section 215.

On Wednesday two terrorists killed 14 innocent people and injured 21 in San Bernandino, California. The hours and days that follow an attack of this nature are critical to discovering its origins and thwarting other attacks. But the FBI has been forced to investigate this attack with one hand tied behind their back because our valuable NSA metadata program was shut down just days earlier.

"To put it simply: the deadliest terrorist attack in the United States since Fort Hood is now serving as the guinea pig in a giant experiment on our national security. It's a frightening and uncomfortable thought."

Once again, the narrative that the FBI has little to no access to phone records is pushed. As is pointed out in Wheeler's post, at the very minimum (if you believe everyone who has been completely wrong on this) the FBI has two years' worth of phone records it can look through, which covers the entire period the attackers were in the US. This may not cover Tashfeen Malik's overseas years, but then again, Section 215 was a domestic program. The NSA's many other surveillance programs would have gathered not just phone records, but internet history, email and other communications. That's if Malik was on its radar, which no one seems to have confirmed to be the case.

So, the FBI would be covered, even in the AP's metadatapocalypse scenario. Chances are, it has years and years of phone records to look through as it investigates this shooting. The NSA has already stated (in its latest FISA court appearance) that records of interest or previously disseminated (to the FBI, for example) will still be accessible by its analysts. Those records go back a minimum of five years. And other records not collected by the Section 215 program go back even further. Marcy Wheeler:

AP misstated how many years of records the FBI might be able to get, claiming it was just two, rather than 28 or more in the case of AT&T’s backbone, covering virtually the entire period during which the husband from the San Bernardino couple, Farook, presumably could speak.

Bridis' article so badly misstates the reality that it encourages theories about government intervention. Did someone nudge Bridis in this direction in hopes of turning public opinion against the recent 215 shutdown? It's hard to believe something this ridiculous would appear unbidden. But, on the other hand, there's no shortage of stupid out there while actual malice remains a far more limited commodity.

Filed Under: fbi, investigation, marco rubio, mass surveillance, nsa, san bernandino, section 215, surveillance, ted birdis