More on NY's Bumbling Holy Warriors

By Jeralyn, Section Terror Trials
Posted on Sat May 23, 2009 at 09:57:07 PM EST
Tags: Bronx synagogue (all tags)

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The TimesonLine quotes TalkLeft pal Terry Kindlon (who represented defendant Yassin Aref in the Albany terror case) on the latest New York Bronx Synagogue bust:

“This whole operation was a foolish waste of time and money,” claimed Terence Kindlon, a defence lawyer who represented the last terror suspect to be tried in New York state. “It is almost as if the FBI cooked up the plot and found four idiots to install as defendants.”

Kindlon’s complaints were echoed by other legal experts who have repeatedly questioned the FBI’s reliance on undercover informants – known as confidential witnesses (CWs) – who lure gullible radicals into far-fetched plots that are then foiled by the agents monitoring them.

Questions raised by the case: [More...]

“One question [about the synagogue case] that has to be answered is: did the informant go in and enlist people who were otherwise not considering trouble ?” said Kevin Luibrand, who represented a Muslim businessman caught up in another FBI sting three years ago. “Did the government induce someone to commit a crime?”

The other question that US security experts were debating was how much had been achieved by assigning more than 100 agents to a year-long investigation of three petty criminals and a mentally ill Haitian immigrant, none of whom had any connection with any known terrorist group. “They were all unsophisticated dimwits,” said Kindlon.

Unsophisticated dimwits and bumbling holy warriors. Shades of Liberty City, where on the third try, the Government finally got their guys.

As Ethan Brown wrote yesterday, the informant in the Bronx Synagogue case is the same informant used by the Government in Terry's case. Terry, in the Aref case, was the first lawyer in a criminal case to file a motion to dismiss based on Bush's warrantless electronic surveillance program.

Ethan has more on the use of informants in the Bronx case here.

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More on NY's Bumbling Holy Warriors | 8 comments (8 topical)

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Kinda makes you wonder (5.00 / 2) (#1)
by Anne on Sat May 23, 2009 at 10:06:07 PM EST

about the quality of the so-called intelligence that is being collected via those indispensible warrantless wiretaps, if this kind of hey-kids-let's-put-on-a-show stuff has had to become such a mainstay of the government's anti-terror work.

i believe that should be (5.00 / 1) (#2)
by cpinva on Sat May 23, 2009 at 11:46:06 PM EST

"foiled", since there wasn't really any actual plot to begin with. how does one foil the non-existent?

for several years, my office was right across the hall from the local FBI office. over time, i got friendly with the agent-in-charge, and i even had a concurrent case with them. we used to chat, and roll our eyes at the idiotic things cooked up by our respective powers-that-be.

my suspicion (and i have no concrete evidence to support it) is that many of these harebrained schemes are run by newbies; not too long out of the academy eager beavers, looking to make their bones. the more experienced (and more cynical) agents won't have anything to do with it, if they can at all avoid it, preferring instead to work on actual criminal/terrorist activity.

that said, the idea for these schemes is coming from the top, and that's where it must be stopped.

What Are The Odds (5.00 / 1) (#3)
by john horse on Sun May 24, 2009 at 06:39:38 AM EST

of the same informant uncovering, not one, but two "terrorist" plots within a period of five years? This looks and smells like a clear case of entrapment to me.

The manpower and resources our government wasted on these terrorism stings could have and should have been spent on uncovering more serious crimes like Wall Street fraud.

Investigators were probably Cheney's men (none / 0) (#4)
by Saul on Sun May 24, 2009 at 08:06:24 AM EST

from the last administration. You said it was 3 year investigation. Cheney would want nothing more than to see another attack on Obama's watch. This was not even a close case but was released to show that Cheney is right about the weakness of Obama.

More likely schooled in Clinton/Reno's DOJ (none / 0) (#5)
by Rojas on Sun May 24, 2009 at 09:57:10 AM EST

where the almost bimonthly arrests of so-called home grown terrorists withoutapottopissin out to killdemocracyasweknowit was to common fodder to keep the reactoinaries on the edge of their seats.

It's a sad damn theme, but there were those who were sayin "you're setting the bar mighty low doncha think?".


please, do cite your (none / 0) (#6)
by cpinva on Sun May 24, 2009 at 11:17:31 AM EST

sources for this claim, i'd be interested to read about it. given the media's intense dislike of all things clinton, i'm surprised they managed to somehow keep this pretty well hidden.


: Hidden in plain sight (none / 0) (#9)
by Rojas on Tue May 26, 2009 at 07:44:42 AM EST

Perhaps you are very young and were just too busy with school to notice. Or maybe you lived in that paralle universe that sucked in so many of the so-called civil rights generation during the clinton years.
If the last two decades have taught us anything at all, the overriding lesson should be, that once again, in this place and time, it is in the center that lies the swamp.

One need not (none / 0) (#7)
by NMvoiceofreason on Sun May 24, 2009 at 12:26:58 PM EST

look to hard to find stupid people in prison.

Donations to their Commisary account - 100$

Fake missiles and bombs - 1000$

Finding them and getting them to join your cause / scam - priceless.