Danny Ocean (George Clooney): "I know a guy. We were in the joint together. Anybody pulls any job in the Western U.S., he knows about it. Give me a few hours, I'll find out who took your money."
Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia): (sardonically) "You know a guy."
Oceans Eleven (2001).
I haven't had much of a chance to write recently... Well, not blogs, or Web site material. Very little on "Karen Three" (although the plot line is smoothing out nicely). I have written quite a bit to Medicare, to the company that has all of my pension money and Delta Dental. So, I am a little rusty when it comes to blogging. Bear with me.
Indignation. Embarrassment. Shame.
That's what I feel about the latest "gate" fiasco. It involves a law enforcement organization that I admire, with whom I've worked closely on several cases and that, day to day, does the grunt work of keeping America and Americans safe from very real dangers arising all over the world. Which is why the Trump Campaign/Russia Collusion investigation and subsequently disclosed outrages are all the more unfathomable. And, predictable.
One of the most attractive ethical violations to which law enforcement officers indulge is the "I know he's guilty" mindset. We are taught to enter each situation with an open mind and follow the evidence wherever it leads. If it leads nowhere, maybe there is no "there" there. Maybe we haven't worked hard enough. Maybe the evidence isn't available to us, or its true character cannot yet be discerned.
Time and again, cops fall victim to their own biases. "This guy is dirty," they will say. "I'm just having a hard time proving it."
Fair enough, sometimes the guy is dirty. But, one of the things we are taught not to do - specifically, repeatedly, emphatically - taught not to do is assume someone is guilty and then work only to reinforce our initial, often emotional, conclusion. It is an article of faith that ignoring the absence of evidence, or worse, hiding evidence proving someone is innocent, is unethical conduct. The chance that an objectively just conclusion will be reached by manipulating facts is sheer happenstance. Often, it results in framing the wrong person.
The available research into "Russia-gate," the investigation of possible collusion between the Trump Campaign/Administration and the Russian government grows larger every day. There have been hearings, investigations, special prosecutors, inspectors general... Books, interviews, testimony. The conclusions one draws about a very complicated situation will often be a matter of perspective. One thing is clear - and many of the players have already admitted to it.
Members of the FBI applied for eavesdropping warrants with the FISA court using information they knew was suspect. In effect, they misrepresented facts in a way to induce a judge to issue court orders. Those orders allowed them to examine the records of an individual associated with the Trump campaign. Because of the "two step rule" agents could examine the records of anyone this person communicated with, and the records of individuals with whom those people communicated.
Those are facts to which the FBI admits. The unanswered question is - WTF?
Okay, the actual question is why. The answer is hinted at by former Director James Comey in his book, and during interviews subsequent to his firing. It is hinted at by well-meaning people who reveal their biases as a means of rationalizing conclusions. It has been the subject of discussion by people with first-hand knowledge of how the world of federal prosecutions works, by members of Congress who undertook (at great personal cost) examinations of facts and by people adept at piecing together chains of events to draw coherent story lines.
They knew a guy.
Specifically, they knew a guy who just knew Orange Man Bad. Hell, I knew a guy, a professor at Syracuse. Some of them know Donald Trump, and don't like him...or, worse. It wasn't a question of corruption - that was a given. It was a question of building the case, collecting the evidence and proving that the Russians interfered with the 2016 election at the behest of Candidate Trump. If shading the truth, and bending the rules got the job done, then the methods would be worth it. Everyone knew what they would find.
He had to be stopped.
That conduct is, in a word, reprehensible.
This was a leadership failure of the most monumental sort. That it happened is irrefutable. What happens now?
The men and women who make up the soul of the FBI - case agents, analyists, operators - must demand accountability of their leadership. They must "lead up," and remind each other on an ongoing basis that the FBI exists to follow the facts in an ethical manner, regardless of who the object is. They must regard everyone as worthy of the utmost in constitutionally-protected rights.
It isn't enough to "know a guy" whose opinion is that someone is crooked.
