DOJ Investigates Law Enforcement Agencies All Over The Nation But Can't Be Bothered To Police Itself
from the backyard-due-to-be-condemned-for-lack-of-upkeep dept
The Justice Department will be investigating the Ferguson PD in the wake of an unarmed citizen’s shooting by Officer Darren Wilson. Already, news has surfaced that the police force has a history of discriminatory actions and a problem with deploying excessive force. But should we even trust the DOJ to do this? If the DOJ is going to police the nation’s police, then it should be holding its own agencies and employees to the highest standards. But it doesn’t. It doesn’t even come close.
Documents obtained by McClatchy News Service [pdf link] reveal incident after incident of misconduct uncovered by the Office of the Inspector General. They range from the merely questionable to the wholly unacceptable, but one thread holds them all together: a nearly complete lack of accountability.
The records, which cover the period from January 2010 to March 2014, detail some 80 cases, only a few of which appear to have been previously made public.
The accused officials work for agencies that include the Drug Enforcement Administration, the U.S. Marshals Service and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
In at least 27 cases, the inspector general identified evidence of possible criminal wrongdoing but no one was prosecuted.
[…]
According to the most recent report by the office, the Justice Department’s inspector general received nearly 5,900 allegations of misconduct, opened 195 investigations and was involved in 32 arrests and 38 convictions from October through March.
Cases referred to the IG involved anything from inappropriate relationships to murder-for-hire. An assistant US attorney general was accused of withholding information about her husband’s embezzlement from investigators. Another federal prosecutor recused herself from a case when it was revealed she had a “personal relationship” with the investigation’s target. This same prosecutor also divulged sensitive information about the case to her husband — who subsequently passed this information along to the target.
Gifts and paid trips were accepted by employees in violation of agency ethics policies. An FBI agent used his government-issued Blackberry to pursue relationships with 17 different women. Another FBI agent misused agency resources to participate in three extramarital affairs. An ATF official worked for Morgan Stanley while on paid leave from the agency. The DHS, ATF and FBI are all called out for engaging in retaliatory behavior against protected whistleblowers.
On and on it goes for 42 pages. Bureau of Prison personnel stole or misused government-purchased equipment. Ethical standards violated. Investigations interfered with. Abuse of position to get out of traffic tickets or obtain goods, services… even surveillance tapes from a private business.
In the end, though, only a few cases were recommended for prosecution. In many cases, the employees retired ahead of pending punishments. In others, employees received nothing more than “oral admonishments.”
And then there’s this complete bullshit:
Sometimes, alleged misconduct by prosecutors and investigators might be handled less aggressively because of concern that it would taint criminal cases, [former Dept. of Interior Inspector General Earl] Devaney said. At trial, defense attorneys are permitted to learn of serious misconduct of the agents and prosecutors involved in their cases.
There’s that infamous criminal justice system again. In order to avoid “losses,” government agencies are burying misconduct allegations or issuing “oral admonishments” to avoid leaving damning paper trails that might call the integrity of their prosecutors and investigators into question. To sum up: the government would rather prosecute a citizen than hold one of its own fully accountable.
When the DOJ starts looking into Ferguson, it had better hope the PD doesn’t just hold up a mirror and dare it to meet its own gaze.
Filed Under: doj, fbi, inspector general, law enforcement
Comments on “DOJ Investigates Law Enforcement Agencies All Over The Nation But Can't Be Bothered To Police Itself”
Wat
“Cases referred to the IG involved anything from inappropriate relationships to murder-for-hire”
You can’t hang out “murder-for-hire” with no other explanation. That’s just rude…
Re: Wat
There it is:
“This year, for instance, a former federal correctional officer in Missouri was sentenced for trying to hire an inmate to murder his wife’s ex-husband.”
Re: Wat
But totally believable.
If the DOJ had integrity, there would be a lot more cops in prison. Since there are not a lot more cops in prison, and they (cops) do murder people without due process, and get away with it, the for hire part becomes likely, at least in some cases. The alternative explanation is that cops are just overly aggressive jack holes…oh wait…
It’s worth noting that it is really hard to police yourself. It requires a strong dedication to integrity and ethics from the top down. The natural tendency is to downplay issues as it negatively impacts your job (can get u fired). This is even more true of political appointees & politicians who have even stronger desire to hide negatives and a general disposition towards hiding it.
Not that any of that makes it acceptable
Spousal immunity
> An assistant US attorney general was accused of withholding information about her husband’s embezzlement from investigators.
a) The wife should not have been involved in the husband’s investigation through her work position (if she was).
b) The wife cannot be criminally liable for withholding information about her husband.
… a decision of the US Suprme Court which said that it was “regarded as so essential to the preservation of the marriage relationship as to outweigh the disadvantages to the administration of justice” (Wolfle v. United States, 291 U.S. 7, 54 S. Ct. 279, 78 L. Ed. 617 [1934]).
c) Even with that, there is debate about whether employment consequences are justified, given that her employer is the government. Were her employer not the government, they could probably fire her if they wanted. As it is, more ticklish.
Re: Spousal immunity
I think the bigger issue is that she did not recuse herself, or quit her job. If she knew about her husbands ongoing criminal activities, and did not report it, then she is as culpable as her husband.
An assistant US attorney covering up for her husband, or anyone else, is just wrong, and they should put her in prison with her husband (or actually a different prison, as putting them together would be wrong also).
Hey, over there - is that a unicorn?!
Classic misdirection…by appearing to investigate and potentially prosecute racist abuses of police authority, the DOJ hopes to present a facade of caring about civil rights.
Criminal Justice System
It does not mean what you think it did.
Time to send them all packing and start from scratch. The stench emanating from D.C. has become intolerable.
“nothing more than “oral admonishments.””
An oral admonishment can be devastating. Especially if it comes from the United Nations to a despot.
But what really makes them tremble is a strongly worded letter.
Police themselves
No law enforcement (or probably any kind of) agency will ever effectively police itself. There needs to be a separate entity not part of the DOJ that has the power to prosecute members of the DOJ. Having investigators that then turn over issues to the DOJ for them to prosecute themselves is just stupid. Obviously nothing is going be done about the problems that way.
Classic
Who Watches the Watchers of the Watchers?