For several months, there has been an ongoing controversy between the city gov’t., primarily Mayor Potter (a former Portland police chief) and the FBI. The FBI operates a joint terrorism task force which includes the Portland Police Bureau. Mayor Potter wants to be kept abreast on how the police officers are being used, but the FBI says they won’t give him the necessary security clearance as he doesn’t have a need to know.
A few days ago it was revealed that a local FBI agent had approached a city hall employee, asking if the employee had any knowledge of wrongdoing in city gov’t. It seems that the FBI agent had observed the employee frequenting a local Starbucks and also that the city employee uses the same gym as the agent. The agent had also observed the employee entering city hall after these encounters. This info. is presented as if it was only a casual observation.
The agent apparently engaged the employee in casual conversation before bringing up gov’t. corruption, then asking if the employee was aware of any in city hall. The employee apparently replied in the negative. The agent then gave the employee his bus. card w/ the request that he be contacted if anything interesting came up.
Mayor Potter is outraged and the ACLU has gotten involved. The local FBI spokesman has admitted the encounter and defends it as justified and just being good police work, cultivating possible informants.
There has been no hint of misdeed in Potter’s administration and the FBI has not implied any.
I don’t know if the task force controversy and the contact of the employee are connected or not, it’s a connection that I’ve made. It hasn’t even been suggested in the media as yet.
This whole thing seems to lend credence to my conviction that we must jealously guard our civil rights and keep a close reign on all gov’t. activities, lest they abuse the power they are given.
Do you see this as I do, or do you disagree, if so please elaborate either way.
We-ell, does the government have civil rights? Does a mayor have the same right not to be investigated without cause as a mayor as he does as a citizen? I don’t know what the best answer is.
Government workers sure as hell have exactly the same rights as the rest of us. That includes being able to disagree with the feds on an issue without having them open an investigation on us “just in case” we do something wrong.
There’s more than enough crime in this country for the FBI to investigate, why are they wasting their time cultivating informants inside an organization that has not been accused of wrongdoing?
The FBI deserves to be taken to task for this, in stark contrast to the recent hubbub in DC.
I didn’t question whether government workers have the same rights when they are civilians. I question whether they have the same rights on their jobs as they do as civilians. I question whether the office brings with it an expected lack of privacy and an expected extra layer of suspicion. Is the FBI investigating a person, or investigating an office? Can a distinction be made?
By a task force?
What specific “civil right” has been violated here?
An FBI agent has every right to approach a citizen and ask that citizen questions, as long as the cooperation is voluntary.
It strikes me that tactics, similar to the the agent approaching the city employee, without any probable cause, or even any hint of suspicion, is what we would expect from an oppressive style gov’t. This reminds me of practices used by the Nazi SS or the KGB, not something we should tolerate in a free democratic society.
As I said before, I can’t help but make a connection between the task force controversy and the “supposedly” casual attempt to recruit an informer inside city gov’t. I’m really suprised that the media hasn’t speculated on this as it seems an obvious possibility to me.
This story just hit the news in the last day or two, I suspect it may get national coverage before long.
So if a person strikes up a casual conversation w/ you, and after awhile I.D.'s himself as a LEO and asks you to keep an eye out for any wrong doing, in your company, or your neighbor, or among your friends and aquaintenances, you think that’s just normal investagatory technique? Remember, there’s no probable cause, no specific suspicion, just a fishing expedition in case you see or hear something the LEO might be interested in.
It depends on how probing the questions/conversations were. Law enforcement needs whistle-blowers. These are the people who help the government with the cases against most of the mutual fund industry, the Enrons and the MCIs. People sometimes need to be reminded that there is someone they can call if things are not right.
Except it’s the government investigating the government. It’s the bigwig in the cell phone commercial chortling about sticking it to The Man. “But you are The Man. You’re sticking it to yourself.”
If wrongdoing is found, is the government going to be punished, or the individuals? This isn’t the FHWA investigating to see if highway funds should be cut. This is the FBI, they investigate crimes that send people to jail.
As such, if they’re using their investigative powers to punish people who disagree with them, that’s an abuse. It might very well be legal, but it’s still improper.
The FBI is apparently attempting to recruit a spy within the city government and have them report any illegal activities, if there are any. This is different than recruiting a spy to report on illegal activities when there is suspicion, if not evidence, that illegal activities are already taking place.
I don’t see any violation of rights from simply asking the question. Likewise, if an EPA member asked someone at a coffee shop, “Hey, do you know if any illegal dumping in the area?” or a cop saying, “Hey, who robs banks around here?”
Now, I certainly can see the Mayor being pissed off about it much as if I might be pissed if someone asked, “hey, do you beat your wife, just asking you know?” because there is an implicit accusation in that statement.
But no, I don’t see anything illegal about an agent simply asking the question at a coffee shop both he and the city employee frequent.
However, if the FBI actually startehd spending their [our] money to investigate a Mayor against whom there have been no charges I would see a case for Fraud, Waste, and Abuse. Likewise, if there was reason to believe the investigation was politically or personally motived then I would see a case for abuse of power.
Still, don’t see any violations of rights.
Unless I’m missing something, this is pretty standard police work. It looks like community policing. The cop is nice and social. He passes around his card and asks to you call if there is a problem. It gives people a name and face to deal with instead of calling various tip lines. I’ve got a card from one of the cops in my neighborhood. He passes them around mostly for people to call about loud parties, drugs, vadalism etc. These are the crimes he’s paid to watch for. I’ve not called them but I never interpreted it as spying. He is just an eager young officer trying to do a good job and move up the ladder.
I suspect this is blowing up because the mayor and FBI are having a conflict to begin with. Maybe the agent was asked to investigate the mayor on the sly. Maybe the agent is just doing the routine job of an FBI agent and passing the card around socially to people that may witness his style of crimes. Someone working in city hall could witness curruption and have nowhere to report it. An FBI agent could be just the right answer. If there isn’t a bank robbery at the moment, a government curruption case would be good for his carreer.
I can see why the mayor would be concerned but it could easily be nothing.
Was this “encounter” just a casual sort of thing, like they were both at the gym, or did this FBI guy knock on his office while he was in full uniform and started asking questions?
I’ll have to find out more before I can really get worked up over something like this.