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Schadow
Vice Admiral
Joined: 30 Sep 2004
Posts: 936
Location: Huntsville, Alabama
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 Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 7:32 pm Post subject: Gorelick speaks |
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In an interview today on Fox, Jamie Gorelick says (paraphrasing), "There never was a 'wall' [between intelligence agencies] and if there was, I didn't do it."
Waiting eagerly for the responses. 
Schadow
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Capt, 8th U.S. Army, Korea '53 - '54 |
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NortonPete
PO2
Joined: 13 Aug 2004
Posts: 385
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| Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 8:00 pm Post subject: |
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Well its never too late to rewrite history.
With the average American having only a 3 month memory,
you can change alot in a brief time period.
Here the WSJ makes it very clear.
AG Ashcroft said:
| Quote: | "In the days before September 11, the wall specifically impeded the investigation into Zacarias Moussaoui, Khalid al-Midhar and Nawaf al-Hazmi. After the FBI arrested Moussaoui, agents became suspicious of his interest in commercial aircraft and sought approval for a criminal warrant to search his computer. The warrant was rejected because FBI officials feared breaching the wall.
"When the CIA finally told the FBI that al-Midhar and al-Hazmi were in the country in late August, agents in New York searched for the suspects. But because of the wall, FBI headquarters refused to allow criminal investigators who knew the most about the most recent al Qaeda attack to join the hunt for the suspected terrorists.
"At that time, a frustrated FBI investigator wrote headquarters, quote, 'Whatever has happened to this--someday someone will die--and wall or not--the public will not understand why we were not more effective and throwing every resource we had at certain 'problems.' "
What's more, Mr. Ashcroft noted, the wall did not mysteriously arise: "Someone built this wall." That someone was largely the Democrats, who enshrined Vietnam-era paranoia about alleged FBI domestic spying abuses by enacting the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
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Ms. Gorelick--an aspirant to Attorney General under a President Kerry.
Oh it could have been worse folks, far worse. All SwiftVets should take your right hand and pat yourself on the back for helping stop Kerry.
( Do this in private, it might be misunderstood in some locales ) |
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homesteader
PO3
Joined: 17 Sep 2004
Posts: 294
Location: wisconsin
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| Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 8:58 pm Post subject: |
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| If Gorelick is simply saying the word "wall" that is progress for our side, even if she is saying it in denying that she built it. It keeps the subject in front of the public and exposes more and more people to compartmentalization that existed before 9/11. |
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SBD
Admiral
Joined: 19 Aug 2004
Posts: 1022
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 7:33 am Post subject: |
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From the US Department of Justice
Special Report: A Review of the FBI's Handling of Intelligence Information Prior to the September 11 Attacks
| Quote: | III. The wall between intelligence and criminal terrorism investigations
Introduction
This section summarizes the creation of the “wall” separating criminal and intelligence terrorism investigations in the Department of Justice. The wall began as a separation of intelligence investigators from contact with criminal prosecutors, and evolved to include a separation of FBI investigators working on intelligence investigations from investigators working on criminal investigations.
As discussed above, FBI terrorism investigations could be opened either as an intelligence investigation in which information was collected for the protection of national security, or as a criminal investigation to prevent a criminal act from occurring or to determine who was responsible for a completed criminal act. In the course of an intelligence investigation, information might be developed from searches or electronic surveillance obtained under FISA. That intelligence information also could be relevant to a potential or completed criminal act. However, concerns were raised that if intelligence investigators consulted with prosecutors about the intelligence information or provided the information to criminal investigators, this interaction could affect the prosecution by allowing defense counsel to argue that the government had misused the FISA statute and it also could affect the intelligence investigation’s ability to obtain or continue FISA searches or surveillances. As a result, procedural restrictions – a wall – were created to separate intelligence and criminal investigations. Although information could be “passed over the wall” – i.e., shared with criminal investigators – this occurred only subject to defined procedures.
The wall separating intelligence and criminal investigations affected [INFORMATION REDACTED] the Hazmi and Mihdhar case. [INFORMATION REDACTED] And as we discuss in detail in Chapter Five, because of the wall – and beliefs about what the wall required – an FBI analyst did not share important intelligence information about Hazmi and Mihdhar with criminal investigators. In addition, also because of the wall, in August 2001 when the New York FBI learned that Hazmi and Mihdhar were in the United States, criminal investigators were not allowed to participate in the search for them.
Because the wall between intelligence and criminal investigations affected these two cases, we provide in this section a description of how the wall was created and evolved in response to the 1978 FISA statute. We also describe the unwritten policy separating criminal and intelligence investigations in the 1980s and early 1990s, the 1995 Procedures that codified the wall, the FISA Court procedures in 2000 that required written certification that the Department had adhered to the wall between criminal and intelligence investigations, and the changes to the wall after the September 11 attacks. |
| Quote: | The 1995 Procedures
Creation of the 1995 Procedures
In late December 1994, at the direction of Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick, the Executive Office for National Security convened a working group to resolve the dispute between OIPR and the FBI and the Criminal Division concerning contacts between the FBI and the Criminal Division. The Criminal Division, OIPR, the FBI, OLC, and the Executive Office for National Security participated in the group. As a result of discussions within the working group, on February 3, 1995, the Executive Office for National Security circulated draft procedures for contacts between the FBI and prosecutors. The draft procedures, “Procedures for Contacts Between the FBI and the Criminal Division Concerning Foreign Intelligence and Foreign Counterintelligence Investigations,” were transmitted on April 12, 1995, by the Executive Office for National Security through the Deputy Attorney General to the Attorney General for approval and implementation.34 The Attorney General signed and issued the procedures on July 19, 1995. These procedures became known as “the 1995 Procedures.”
Description of the 1995 Procedures
In general, the 1995 Procedures rejected OIPR’s original proposal of giving it the sole authority to decide when FBI agents could consult with Criminal Division prosecutors on an intelligence investigation. However, the 1995 Procedures gave OIPR formal oversight over contacts between the FBI and the Criminal Division in intelligence cases, and the procedures formalized restrictions on the extent that Criminal Division prosecutors could be involved in intelligence investigations. The procedures applied to intelligence investigations both in which a FISA search or surveillance was being conducted and in which no FISA order had been issued.35
The 1995 Procedures formalized the unwritten policy that had existed since the 1980s requiring the Criminal Division, rather than the local USAO, to be consulted about intelligence investigations when questions of criminal activity or criminal prosecution arose.36 The 1995 Procedures required that the FBI and OIPR notify the Criminal Division when “facts or circumstances [were] developed that reasonably indicate[d] that a significant federal crime [had] been, [was] being, or [might have been] committed.”
In cases in which FISA surveillance was being conducted, the 1995 Procedures provided that OIPR as well as the Criminal Division had to approve an FBI field office’s request to take an investigation to the USAO. Guidance issued by the FBI Director that accompanied the 1995 Procedures instructed FBI field offices that any potential contact with prosecutors (either the Criminal Division or requests to consult with the USAO) had to be coordinated through FBI Headquarters.
In cases in which no FISA warrant had been issued, the 1995 Procedures required that the Criminal Division decide when it was appropriate to involve the USAO in the intelligence investigation, although notice of the decision had to be given to OIPR. For example, as discussed in Chapter Four, the FBI Minneapolis Field Office opened the Moussaoui investigation as an intelligence investigation, but then wanted to seek a criminal search warrant from the USAO. Since an intelligence investigation was opened but no FISA warrant had been issued, the Minneapolis FBI needed permission – which it was required to obtain through FBI Headquarters – from the Criminal Division in order to approach the USAO for a criminal search warrant.
Under the 1995 Procedures, the Criminal Division was responsible for notifying OIPR of, and giving OIPR an opportunity to participate in, all of the Criminal Division’s consultations with the FBI concerning intelligence investigations in which a FISA warrant had been obtained. In intelligence investigations where no FISA warrant had been obtained, the Criminal Division had to provide notice to OIPR of its contacts with the FBI. In both types of cases, the FBI was required to maintain a log of all its contacts with the Criminal Division.
The 1995 Procedures provided that in intelligence investigations the Criminal Division could give advice to the FBI “aimed at preserving the option of a criminal prosecution,” but could not “instruct the FBI on the operation, continuation, or expansion of FISA electronic surveillance or physical searches.” In addition, the FBI and the Criminal Division were required to ensure that the advice intended to preserve the prosecution did not “inadvertently result in either the fact or the appearance of the Criminal Division’s directing or controlling [the investigation] toward law enforcement objectives.” |
| Quote: |
Additional restrictions on sharing intelligence information
In addition to the wall between FBI intelligence investigators and criminal prosecutors, a wall within the FBI between criminal investigations and intelligence investigations also was created. Although it is unclear exactly when this wall within the FBI began, sometime between 1995 and 1997 the FBI began segregating intelligence investigations from criminal investigations and restricting the flow of information between agents who conducted intelligence investigations and agents who conducted criminal investigations.
As discussed above, in a position paper prepared by OIPR when the Department was considering the 1995 Procedures, OIPR recommended that the FBI be required to open separate and parallel criminal and intelligence investigations, and that the FBI place “a wall” between the two investigations by staffing the criminal investigation with FBI agents who did not have access to the intelligence investigation. This wall was intended to ensure that information from each investigation would be fully admissible in the other. OIPR proposed certain procedures for sharing information developed in the intelligence investigation that was relevant to the criminal investigation, a process that was referred to as “passing information over the wall.”
The process for passing information from the intelligence investigation to the criminal investigation was that an FBI employee – usually the SSA of an international terrorism squad, the Chief Division Counsel of a field office, or an FBI Headquarters employee – would be permitted to review raw FISA intercepts or materials seized pursuant to a FISA and act as a screening mechanism to decide what to “pass” to the criminal investigators or prosecutors.
In March 1995, at the direction of the Department, the FBI established special “wall” procedures for the New York Field Office’s handling of the criminal and intelligence investigations that arose out of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. It is unclear when similar procedures were employed throughout the FBI. By 1997 OIPR was including a description of the screening or “wall” procedures in all FISA applications that were filed with the FISA Court when a criminal investigation was opened.37 The particular screening mechanism proposed by OIPR and approved by the Attorney General depended on how far the criminal investigation had developed.38 If the case had recently been initiated, the SSA was usually the screener. In a case in which the USAO already was involved, others could be the screener, such as an attorney in the FBI’s Office of General Counsel, OIPR, or the Attorney General. According to James Baker, the current OIPR Counsel,39 in late 1999 the Department proposed the use of the FISA Court as “the wall.” The purpose of this proposal was to ensure that the FISA Court would approve FISA applications related to threats involving the Millennium where there was a substantial nexus with related criminal cases. |
SBD |
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shawa
CNO
Joined: 03 Sep 2004
Posts: 2004
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| Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 9:10 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | In an interview today on Fox, Jamie Gorelick says (paraphrasing), "There never was a 'wall' [between intelligence agencies] and if there was, I didn't do it." |
HUH??? UNBELIEVABLE!!
Is she in lala land in total denial?
How can she deny the memo that SHE wrote clearly ENFORCING the wall. AND I still believe that the memo was written to impede the investigation of "Chinagate" which was hot at the time.
I remember Ashcroft's testimony to the 911 Commission. He presented the memo to the shocked commission and said this memo was written by a MEMBER OF THIS COMMISSION.
I jumped out of my chair shouting "YES!! nail that broad!" It was a priceless "Perry Mason" moment.
Also, when Condi Rice testified, Gorelick even had the unmitigated gall to harrass Condi Rice about her statement "we have big systemic problems. The FBI doesn't work the way it should, and it doesn't communicate with the intelligence community."
Condi let her have it!
This article from WorldNetDaily recounts and provides link to PDF of the memo.
| Quote: | Ashcroft nails Clintonite in setting blame for 9-11
States panel member Gorelick wrote memo that became 'single greatest structural cause'
Posted: April 13, 2004
Sept. 11 Commission member Jamie Gorelick wrote a 1995 memo that established a "wall" between the criminal and intelligence divisions, hindering the ability of the U.S. government to detect the Sept. 11, 2001, plot, according to testimony today by Attorney General John Ashcroft.
The document by Gorelick [pdf file], who served as deputy attorney general under President Clinton, helped establish the "single greatest structural cause" for Sept. 11, which was "the wall that segregated criminal investigators and intelligence agents," Ashcroft said in his prepared statement.
Gorelick was a Democratic appointee to the commission probing how the government handled the threat to terrorism leading to the 9-11 attacks.
"Government erected this wall," Ashcroft said. "Government buttressed this wall. And before September 11, government was blinded by this wall."
The attorney general, who declassified the document for the commission, said he believed panel members were not aware of it, even though it was written by one of their own.
"Although you understand the debilitating impact of the wall, I cannot imagine that the commission knew about this memorandum, so I have declassified it for you and the public to review," he said. "Full disclosure compels me to inform you that its author is a member of this commission."
The memo, entitled "Instructions on Separation of Certain Foreign Counterintelligence and Criminal Investigations," contained orders to FBI Director Louis Freeh and others.
It said: "We believe that it is prudent to establish a set of instructions that will more clearly separate the counterintelligence investigation from the more limited, but continued, criminal investigations. These procedures, which go beyond what is legally required, will prevent any risk of creating an unwarranted appearance that FISA is being used to avoid procedural safeguards which would apply in a criminal investigation."
Ashcroft said that by 2000, "the Justice Department was so addicted to the wall, it actually opposed legislation to lower the wall. Finally, the USA Patriot Act tore down this wall between our intelligence and law enforcement personnel in 2001. And when the Patriot Act was challenged, the FISA Court of Review upheld the law, ruling that the 1995 guidelines were required by neither the Constitution nor the law."
Ashcroft insisted that had he known a terrorist attack was imminent in 2001, he would have "unloaded our full arsenal of weaponry against it – despite the inevitable criticism."
"But the simple fact of September 11 is this: We did not know an attack was coming because for nearly a decade our government had blinded itself to its enemies."
Ashcroft said U.S. agents "were isolated by government-imposed walls, handcuffed by government-imposed restrictions, and starved for basic information technology. The old national intelligence system in place on September 11 was destined to fail."
Legal group wants Gorelick to step down
The Landmark Legal Foundation, a national public interest law firm, has formally requested that Gorelick step down from the commission because she is "hopelessly conflicted" in her role as a member.
The group, headed by Mark Levin, contends there are "numerous issues about which she has knowledge" resulting from her service as deputy attorney general from 1994 to 1997.
As the second most powerful Justice official, Landmark notes, Gorelick oversaw the management, budget and policy objectives of the department, including the FBI, which are a key focus of the commission.
Gorelick recused herself from testimony today by former FBI Director Louis Freeh, but Landmark said this is no substitute for her testimony.
"Moreover, as a commission member," the group said, "Ms. Gorelick will have input into the commission's findings, including those related to areas involving her past role. If Ms. Gorelick does not immediately step aside, many in the public will undoubtedly conclude that the commission's work has been compromised."
As an example, Landmark quotes former Chief Assistant United States Attorney Andrew C. McCarthy, who said Gorelick was "an architect of the government's self-imposed procedural wall, intentionally erected to prevent intelligence agents from pooling information with their law-enforcement counterparts."
McCarthy stated in a National Review column Gorelick was "committed to the bitter end to the law enforcement mindset" of addressing terrorism.
Writing in National Review Online, Ethan Wallison, notes during questioning of National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice, Gorelick pointed to a report from 2001 that indicated, in her own words, that "we have big systemic problems. The FBI doesn't work the way it should, and it doesn't communicate with the intelligence community."
In the ensuing dialogue, however, Rice apparently implicated Gorelick in the allegation.
Gorelick: Now, you have said that your policy review was meant to be comprehensive. You took your time because you wanted to get at the hard issues and have a hard-hitting, comprehensive policy. And yet there is nothing in [the policy review] about the vast domestic landscape that we were all warned needed so much attention. Can you give me the answer to the question why?
Rice: I would ask the following. We were there for 233 days. There had been a recognition for a number of years before – after the '93 [World Trade Center] bombing, and certainly after the [thwarted] millennium [attack in Los Angeles] – that there were challenges inside the United States, and that there were challenges concerning our domestic agencies and the challenges concerning the FBI and the CIA. We were in office 233 days. It's absolutely the case that we did not begin structural reform at the FBI. |
_________________
“I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress, and grow brave by reflection. ‘Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.” (Thomas Paine, 1776) |
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ocsparky101
PO1
Joined: 03 Sep 2004
Posts: 479
Location: Allen Park. Michigan
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| Posted: Tue Sep 26, 2006 1:39 pm Post subject: |
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| It is said by the Attorney General of the State of Colorado at the time of the World Trade Center that it was Jamie Gorelick that interfered with the State Investigation of the Bombing even refusing to turn over evidence. Some day the FBI will come clean and expose the Clinton Administration for what it was. |
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Doll
Commander
Joined: 04 Jul 2005
Posts: 339
Location: The Beltway
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| Posted: Tue Sep 26, 2006 7:29 pm Post subject: |
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| shawa wrote: | How can she deny the memo that SHE wrote clearly ENFORCING the wall. AND I still believe that the memo was written to impede the investigation of "Chinagate" which was hot at the time.
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This is typical and to say the least I believe it is called 'selective momory', which seems to happen a lot in our present day politics. Gorelick is off base completely.
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The HILL Chronicles
Soldiers' Angels
"Wednesday Hero - Google It!" |
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BuffaloJack
Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy
Joined: 10 Aug 2004
Posts: 1637
Location: Buffalo, New York
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| Posted: Tue Sep 26, 2006 8:02 pm Post subject: |
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It's absolutely incredible that such an inept twit as Gorelick every got to the position of authority that she had.
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Swift Boats - Qui Nhon (12/69-4/70), Cat Lo (4/70-5/70), Vung Tau (5/70-12/71) |
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