We've talked a lot about the dangers of using what we call "purchased testimony," by which we mean the testimony of informants or cooperating individuals that is obtained by the Government through promises of leniency in their own criminal cases. After all, given a chance at a reduced sentence or no sentence at all through immunity, who among that group do you think would not lie or stretch the truth, or at least provide the prosecutor's or FBI's version of the truth, to save their own hide?

As we've often said, freedom is a far more precious commodity than money, and the snitch system makes it too easy for untrustworthy, unreliable wrong-doers to fabricate or embellish a story to get someone else in trouble and thereby cut themselves some slack.

And now we have a great example. ABC News is reporting that the FBI alert for five men thought to have entered the U.S. from Canada on Christmas Eve was based on a hoax by an informant who was trying to get leniency in his own criminal case in exchange for the information.

"The FBI has concluded the information that led to a hunt for five men thought to have entered the United States illegally on Christmas Eve was fabricated by an informant, ABC News reported on Monday."

"Citing unnamed sources, the report said the informant identified as Michael John Hamdani, who was arrested in Canada, made up the story about 19 men who sought false passports in an attempt to get himself off the hook on criminal charges he was facing in the United States."

Case closed.