Gunner Asch wrote:
On 23 Dec 2005 15:49:22 -0800, jim rozen
wrote:


They tried to get a FISA warrant to search a stumbling bumbling
students laptop, a fellow named Moussaoui.

They were unable to do so in a complicated wrangle.


Here is what really happened Gunner....

In Moussaoui's case, the FBI did not seek an FISA warrant to search his
laptop computer and other belongings in the weeks prior to the Sept. 11
attacks because some officials believed that they could not adequately show
the court Moussaoui's connection to a foreign terrorist group.

The USA Patriot Act, a set of anti-terrorism measures passed last fall,
softened the standards for obtaining intelligence warrants, requiring that
foreign intelligence be a significant, rather than primary, purpose of the
investigation. The FISA court said in its ruling that the new law was not
relevant to its decision.

Despite its rebuke, the court left the door open for a possible solution,
noting that its decision was based on the existing FISA statute and that
lawmakers were free to update the law if they wished.

Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee have indicated their willingness
to enact such reforms but have complained about resistance from Ashcroft.
Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) said yesterday's release was a "ray of
sunshine" compared to a "lack of cooperation" from the Bush administration.

Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), another committee member, said the legal
opinion will "help us determine what's wrong with the FISA process,
including what went wrong in the Zacarias Moussaoui case. The stakes
couldn't be higher for our national security at home and abroad."

The ruling, signed by the court's previous chief, U.S. District Judge Royce
C. Lamberth, was released by the new presiding judge, U.S. District Judge
Colleen Kollar-Kotelly.

FBI and Justice Department officials have said that the fear of being
rejected by the FISA court, complicated by disputes such as those revealed
yesterday, has at times caused both FBI and Justice officials to take a
cautious approach to intelligence warrants.

Until the current dispute, the FISA court had approved all but one
application sought by the government since the court's inception. Civil
libertarians claim that record shows that the court is a rubber stamp for
the government; proponents of stronger law enforcement say the record
reveals a timid bureaucracy only willing to seek warrants on sure winners.

The opinion itself -- and the court's unprecedented decision to release
it -- suggest that relations between the court and officials at the Justice
Department and the FBI have frayed badly.

FISA applications are voluminous documents, containing boilerplate language
as well as details specific to each circumstance. The judges did not say the
misrepresentations were intended to mislead the court, but said that in
addition to erroneous statements, important facts have been omitted from
some FISA applications.

In one case, the FISA judges were so angered by inaccuracies in affidavits
submitted by FBI agent Michael Resnick that they barred him from ever
appearing before the court, according to the ruling and government sources.

Referring to "the troubling number of inaccurate FBI affidavits in so many
FISA applications," the court said in its opinion: "In virtually every
instance, the government's misstatements and omissions in FISA applications
and violations of the Court's orders involved information sharing and
unauthorized disseminations to criminal investigators and prosecutors."

The judges were also clearly perturbed at a lack of answers about the
problems from the Justice Department, which is still conducting an internal
investigation into the lapses.

"How these misrepresentations occurred remains unexplained to the court,"
the opinion said.

© 2002 The Washington Post Company

--
John R. Carroll
Machining Solution Software, Inc.
Los Angeles San Francisco
www.machiningsolution.com