FISA court publicly rips FBI over improper surveillance

Cpl Jeff N. You're following it correctly Corporal Jeff. Any information gathered as the result of an unlawful warrant is inadmissible as what is called fruit of the poisonous tree. Many cases have been lost by even seasonED law enforcement officers for getting in over their head.

SSG Matthew Adkins when misconduct is uncovered on the part of the prosecutor it calls into question all prior prosecutions where a guilty plea was obtained or a plea agreement was obtained.

SSG Matthew Adkins I have spent 40 years in law enforcement. I can assure you that if a prosecutor is found guilty of misconduct inasmuch as s/he tampers with evidence, fails to turn over exculpatory evidence, and especially in this case where it was discovered that the prosecutors embedded a trackable image within a legal document that allow them to receive copies of confidential Communications between a suspect and his attorney, all prior convictions and plea agreements will automatically be re-evaluated. There's no such thing as a harmless error in the examples I'm giving. I am referring to misconduct and I apologize if that was not clear.

SSG Matthew Adkins I agree Sarge. I can't imagine that it was not a calculated move on his part. That is to say I think he knowingly did it expecting that at some point defense counsel would be brought into the loop and I base that on the following news article that has been replicated numerous times if you were to Google it. They all pretty much say the same thing. Your initial comment that harmless errors would not invoke a review of Prior prosecutions is accurate. This was hardly an innocent mistake. The Commander has already admitted it was deliberate although it's unknown if he has confessed to doing it for the purpose of spying on the defense team.

Since leaving law enforcement I've been involved owning my own web hosting company and I'm particularly web Savvy and infrastructure savvy. I'll be honest I didn't know we could do such a thing. But apparently spammers do. That's how they can tell if you have opened a message. It's not the big long line that follows the address. It's got an ET phone home feature in it.

I suppose it's conceivable that the prosecutor thought he was tracking down a leak considering he sent it to the news media. But this guy is not stupid. He's a Commander. He had to know at some point it would get to the defense team and I suppose very much like the way they spread the Steele dossier around and then back stopped it by sending it to Yahoo and Google and AOL and everybody else is if to create the appearance that everybody was talking about it so it must be true, they did something along the same lines in that they sent it to everybody and eventually it got to the defense and bingo. They were in the back door.

I don't imagine when it comes time for this officer to come up to have his commission extended he'll receive an offer. 15-17 years may have just gone down the drain. His pension right along with it. You can be assured that they're going to go back into prior correspondence and see if they can find a similar tracking device and if that happens then you will see a wholesale investigation into the commander and his prosecution's. This is one of the reasons I got out of the military. They say the military has the best legal system in the world. I don't know about that.

https://www.navytimes.com/news/2019/06/04/lead-navy-prosecutor-in-seal-war-crime-case-out-over-email-spying/

Or counterpoint there was only one request that didn't have sufficient evidence.

Lt Col John (Jack) Christensen Yes Colonel, I imagine that was probably the case. But it was still declined. That would somewhat work against my statement of them rubber-stamping, although I believe to a large extent they've been rubber-stamping. They peruse the application for the warrant and they just take their big old stamp out and it's approved. The chief judge, Rosemary Collyer, truthfully stated that in essence they relied heavily on the FBI and the justice department to give them accurate information. She further stated, and this is highly unusual for a FISA judge to speak publicly as you probably know, that when there's exculpatory information the agency is required to present that as well. That was exactly what was not done in the case of Carter Page which started us down the road that we have spent more than two and a half years traveling down.

As you suggest however one of them during the perusing state may not have had sufficient evidence to warrant a warrant. I believe strongly in FISA being able to do their work.

In fact, when I'm on YouTube I see these people doing First Amendment audits at power plants and government contractors and various other things that are high value targets and they just push the envelope. It really ticks me off that because of the First Amendment they get away with it. They go to a nuclear plant and they get these extremely well-trained paramilitary type responders all worked up just because some guys decide to start walking around the compound shooting video. I live near San Bernardino California where the mass shooting occurred three years ago I believe - December because it was Christmas party that was taking place. You may recall that that incident required the government to get involved quite heavily with Apple who refused to crack the encryption on the phone. The government paid somebody $1,000,000 who cracked it in no time flat and when they got in they found pictures of government facilities all around the area.The primary suspect was an inspector of County buildings and he took pictures everywhere. Elementary schools. Electrical distribution substations. Water purification plants. Some would see these as soft targets while others based on their security are clearly not. You can see from that why I would be very, very apprehensive of people exercising their legitimate First Amendment rights and choosing targets designed to create the most fuss. When you have somebody like that and they begin building a pattern is when FISA should step in and give the authorities the ability to go to the next step.

I don't want to drag this out other than to say that you're probably correct sir. One just did not meet the criteria.

SSG Robert Ricci All well and possibly true but ignores the fact that the first FISA warrant on Page was issued around 2012 so 2016 isn't really the hearing that started us down this road. I'll readily acknowledge that rubber stamping most likely creeps in after multiple reissuing hearings but the need to continue investigation was entirely valid.

Lt Col John (Jack) Christensen sounds like someone's got a bee in their bonnet.

“Page had been the subject of a secret intelligence surveillance warrant since 2014, earlier than had been previously reported, US officials briefed on the probe told CNN.”

There is conflicting information as to whether Carter page became the subject of a FISA warrant in 2013 or 2014. What is not in dispute is that he became someone that the FBI was aware of in 2013, not 2012.

On Feb. 2, 2018, FOX News’ Dana Perino said, “[IF] Carter Page is under a FISA warrant starting in 2013. You have to go to the FISA court every 90 days in order to keep up that warrant. We don’t know if there was a lapse in the warrant between 2013 and 2015.” this would have been well before President Trump announced plans to run for president.

On Feb. 5, 2018, CNN’s Justice Correspondent, Jessica Schneider said, “In 2014, the FBI began surveilling Page’s communications under a FISA warrant.”).

Over the entire 33-year period, the FISA court granted 33,942 warrants, with only 12 denials – a rejection rate of 0.03 percent of the total requests. This does not include the number of warrants that were modified by the FISA court. That means one FISA warrant was declined every 1004 days.

So what's the real issue, Jack?

Very true. No fault of Comey's though. Just ask him.

TSgt David L. - of course not, he just signed off on the BS!

LTC David Brown - LOL DC at its finest!

PO3 Bob McCord - He is a waste of flesh.