The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

    Terrorists Under Every Bed

    By A Guy Called LULU on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 1:38pm |

    I am not endorsing the charge made in this article, but it is worth reading, that the men charged with making Molotov cocktails to use at the NATO demonstrations were framed. How would I know at this time? People stupid enough to act as we are told they did do, in fact, exist. What I will say is that I would not be surprised if it turned out that they were. Would anyone else here be surprised?

    Thinking back on various terrorist plots that have been busted recently I see one commonality, the good guys had a plant on the inside in every case. And, they seem to be getting all the bad guys who actually intended to act. They seem to be batting a thousand. They are that good, but only with the aid of all the intrusive surveillance that these successes justify. How many successful bombings have there been? In Chicago they apparently nabbed everyone who wanted to throw Molotov cocktails unless someone threw some that I didn't hear about. Like in other cases, we are told that the bad guys were busted because they were willing to share their criminal plans with new acquaintances.


    Some more of the fortuitous terror interruptions have extremely unlikely plot devices as unbelievable as those necessary to connect the scenes of a bad action movie. In the Yemen printer-bomb case, in what seemed to me to fit a concocted story which attempts to explain how they found the only bombs to be air mailed among the many thousand that are sent every day, the government told us that the plot was busted because someone within the terrorist group revealed it at the last moment and gave the Saudi intelligence service the tracking numbers of the bombs. That was mighty handy.  If that story is true then that was a mighty valuable source. Unfortunately for that source he was revealed, if he existed, and probably suffered a quick, or worse yet, a very slow, death. How many people within the terrorist group that supposedly sent the bombs would have known the tracking numbers. But he had to exist and his existence had to be revealed to make the interception believable.

    Then there was the plot to kill the Saudi ambassador. That was believable? There are more, as we all know.

    So, rather than drag this out further, I ask again, would anyone here be surprised if the  wanna-be 'terrrorists' in Chicago were framed?

    Comments

    I think you're onto something, Lulu.  While "framed" might be too strong a word for it, it does seem to me that not many people in the world really want to make and use explosive devices against their fellow humans.  Sure, some people will talk about it.  They might even talk about it a lot, if presented with the right audience.  But the fact remains that it is difficult to do, both technically and emotionally.

    Enter the undercover agent, who can provide the enthusiastic audience for such rants, threats and fantasies.  The undercover agent can also make the technical and emotional issues go away.  The technical stuff is easy, the agent just introduces the target to somebody who will sell them "bomb making equipment."  The emotions are worn down by encouragement from the agent.

    Yes, it seems as if they are batting a thousand.  Now, some of that might be that they only tell us about the stings that work perfectly.  But, the fact remains that no bridges have been blown up, no shopping malls have been set ablaze and there have been no mass murders at sporting events.

    It's impossible to prove a negative, but my hunch is that all of those statements would be true without these FBI and police sting operations.  It's not that easy to obtain and assemble sophisticated explosive devices.  America is not Iraq or Afghanistan.   It's a country at piece.  Most people, including your humble blogger, would not be capable of say, buying dynamite or plastic explosives from an untraceable source, much less putting the stuff to evil use.

    All of these stings amount to security theatre so far as I'm concerned.  They are also ruining lives.  Disgruntled people who were likely harmless except for their words, are going to spend long terms in harsh prisons where, if they weren't radicalized before, they surely will be.  But nobody cares about these lives because they are extremely unsympathetic people.  By the time the public meets them, they have already pushed the button on a phony detonator that they thought would kill hundreds.


    by Michael Maiello on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 2:04pm

    The legal defense is whether the defendants were entrapped, and the entrapment defense depends on whether the defendant was or was not "predisposed" to commit the crime.  So we don't know the facts, but I would think if these were kids just popping off about doing something nasty, and if they have no prior criminal record, etc., chances are they will have a good defense of entrapment.  And thank heavens for the ACLU in cases like this.


    by Bruce Levine on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 3:22pm

    I suspect that entrapment defenses might work in a case of sexual solicitation or buying drugs, but even then it's a longshot.  In these terrorism cases, you have a much less sympathetic perp.  You have somebody who might not have a criminal record but who has left an online trail of sometimes hyperbolic statements on extremists Web sites, for example.  And, whether or not they were pushed into it, you have somebody who pushed a button, sincere in the belief that hundreds of people would be killed or injured as a result.

    It might well be that I'm too willing to believe that people won't do these things, or that I overestimate how difficult they are to do.  But I think that these stings re doing damage that the justice system is ill-equipped to fix.


    by Michael Maiello on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 3:42pm

    Heritage Foundation has compiled a list of at least 50 publicly known Islamist-inspired terror plots targeting the United States have been foiled since 9/11 published late last month in this article:

    http://www.eurasiareview.com/26042012-fifty-terror-plots-foiled-since-91...

    I know, I know, everyone in the liberal blogosphere hates the Heritage Foundation. The thing is, you can ignore their spin on it; the list itself is useful starting point to make an judgment for yourself on what and how the Feds have been doing on this front overall, better than just going on gut reaction to a few cases and surmising about the rest from that.


    by artappraiser on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 4:51pm

    The Heritage people do legitimate work, no doubt.  And they're honest about their spin so, people can read with discernment.

    Heck, these are the people who came up with Obama's healthcare plan! :)

    I agree with this statement from the document you linked to:

    "Yet, lacking the support of broader terrorist networks, violent extremists may lack a profound understanding of such specialized skills as bomb making, as well as financing, support networks, and training, causing them to be reluctant or even unable to carry out a large-scale, highly destructive attack independently."

    But, there's obviously varying degrees of threat.  The liquid explosives in printer cartridges did seem pretty darned sophisticated.  Though, it originated overseas.  The homegrown terrorists seem to be more of the Lackawana Six variety -- a bunch of semi-adults playing GI Joe in their back yard.


    by Michael Maiello on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 6:10pm

    I have only skimmed some of the reports beginning with the most recent and going backwards in chronological order.
     Quotes from individual case descriptions:

    #50--He did not know that the weapons had already been rendered inoperable, as they had been provided to him by FBI agents he believed to be al-Qaeda operatives.

    #49--He was introduced to an undercover FBI agent who he believed was an arms dealer and procured disabled AK-47s and explosives from him.

    #48--The plot was uncovered by an informant and Pimentel was arrested by the NYPD.

    #47--The plot was uncovered because the supposed members of the cartel he approached were informants for the Drug Enforcmeent Agency.[


    #46--He did so believing the man would use the cell phone to detonate improvised explosive devices against American soldiers. The alleged al-Qaeda operative was an undercover FBI agent.

    #45--Did not mention undercover operatives or informants.

    #44--The two suspects had arranged to purchase weapons from an anonymous informant in contact with the Seattle Police Department.

    #43--Did not mention undercover operatives or informants

    #42--'                                                                                   '

    @41--was arrested by the FBI after placing an order for the toxic chemical phenol. Both the chemical supplier and the freight shipping company became suspicious of the order, which could be used to make an improvised explosive device (IED), and alerted the FBI and local police

    #40--The FBI learned of the plot from an unnamed informant.
    The bomb was composed of inert explosives given to him by undercover FBI agent

    #39-- No undercover or informant mentioned.

    #38--This is the printer bomb case. The packages contained printer cartridges filled with the explosive material and were identified with the help of intelligence tips from Saudi Arabian authorities while in transit on cargo planes in the United Kingdom and Dubai.

    #37--Ahmed is said to have conducted surveillance on the D.C. Metrorail system on multiple occasions, and was in contact with undercover FBI agents whom he believed to be individuals affiliated with al-Qaeda.

    This takes us back to October 2010.


    by A Guy Called LULU on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 7:18pm

    It just occurred to me after seeing this

    Texas man gets 20 years in jail for al Qaeda links
    By Agence France-Presse, May 24, 2012 19:19 EDT

    that if one was counting prosecutions of terrorists in general, the list would not be very comprehensive, because it focuses on plots disrupted but doesn't include charges like this example: attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization


    by artappraiser on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 11:38pm

    Another just convicted in Texas, also not on the list:

    U.S. soldier convicted in base attack plot
    Agence France Presse, May 2, 2012

    CHICAGO — A US soldier who fled his post as a Muslim conscientious objector was convicted Thursday of plotting an attack on a Texas military base, prosecutors said.

    Naser Jason Abdo, 22, faces a maximum sentence of life in prison over the plot to attack soldiers and their families at the Fort Hood base in Texas, the scene of a deadly shooting rampage in 2009 [....]

    “It’s important to note that this plot was interrupted and a potential tragedy prevented because an alert citizen notified law enforcement of suspicious activity, triggering prompt investigation and intervention,” said Robert Pitman, US attorney for the Western District of Texas [....]


    by artappraiser on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 2:50am

    Heritage Foundation has compiled a list of at least 50 publicly known Islamist-inspired terror plots ...
     
    Yes, The Heritage Foundation has their ideological point of view which naturally puts a spin on their evaluations. We all do that. I believe that some of their spin, though, is cynically calculated more than just a reflection of ideology and qualifies as propaganda. An example is labeling the 50 plots as being "Islamist-inspired". That demonizes people as a group who are of the Islamic faith and who are of that faith for the same reason you and I are, or were, Catholic; our parents were, and it is just as wrong as using that affiliation to group us with pedophiles and implicitly demonize us as pedophiles. An atheistic or agnostic citizen of a predominately Islamic country might very well have some hard feelings against the USA.

    ...because it [the list] focuses on plots disrupted but doesn't include charges like this example: attempting to provide material support to a designated foreign terrorist organization..

    Yes, some who are charged with that crime are convicted, and that conviction is sometimes an illegitimate method of suppression of others through warning by example of harsh consequences, more than  it is the legitimate neutralization of a meaningful threat. Some other elites who are actually highly affective in their material support for designated terrorist organizations get paid handsomely for that material support and maintain their positions of influence and status among other elites rather than going to jail.

    In the article I linked to the author gives several examples of cops framing people and sending them to prison. I can easily believe that the conviction of the cops when caught framing innocents was legitimate because I believe that cops have enormous institutional protection and a jury can always be found ready to give them very high benefit of any doubt. Terrorist suspects have the polar opposite situation. Guilty cops are convicted far less often than are others charged with crime who are actually innocent. At the same time, I have no doubt that those same cops dealt with some genuine bad guys and legitimately brought them to justice. So, as Trope says below:

     we shouldn't be surprised if they were framed
    and
    we shouldn't be surprised if they were not framed.

     And I am no longer surprised that most people don't care one way or the other so long is it is the 'other' who might be getting framed.


    by A Guy Called LULU on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 12:55pm

    In terms of the public, I also think there is a distinction made between framing an innocent person who is innocent overall, and framing an individual who is innocent of the crime they are being tried for but "guilty" of other crimes that cannot be proved in a court of law.

    In other words, there are many in the public who don't have a strong reaction if the police plant evidence on a "known" drug dealer in order to bust them.  One of the most common storyline on the police shows is the gang member or murderer who everyone knows is guilty but because of the "rules of law" they avoid prosecution.  Conservative politicians have spent considerable amount of air time bashing the liberals and their liberal court systems that lets thugs and rapists back on the street because they care more about the rights of the criminals than the rights of the victims.  If police are driven to take the law into their own hands and plant evidence to get the "scum" off the street, then they should be applauded rather than prosecuted.

    I'm not saying that this is what is happening in Philadelphia and NJ, but when talking about police framing individuals, this sentiment needs to be taken into consideration, if one is attempting to convince people this is a serious issue.


    by Elusive Trope on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 1:44pm

    If police are driven to take the law into their own hands and plant evidence to get the "scum" off the street, then they should be applauded rather than prosecuted.

    Who would have guessed that Trope would fall back on his old trope and applaud cops for taking the law into their own hands? Like I said, I am no longer surprised.


    by A Guy Called LULU on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 1:57pm

    Hey, it worked for the KGB ... until the Soviet Union crumbled. No doubt the same thing will happen here.


    by Donal on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 2:03pm

    I was about to caution Trope to stress that he was citing the opinion of Conservative politicians (see the sentence prior to the one you're quoting) and not his own view point (I assume) as I was certain some people would take it as the latter…


    by Verified Atheist on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 2:08pm

    yup


    by Elusive Trope on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 2:12pm

    I was not taking this position, I was just putting it out there as being a strong sentiment within the public. 

    If you go around shouting "the police are framing people!" and you get a "so?" response, it is in large part not because they don't police frame people, it is because they believe the police frame people who probably should be behind bars. 

    If you want people to start taking this issue is significant and needs to be addressed, one has to show that it is the law-abiding citizens that the police are just framing for the heck of it or for some other weird reason.

    I personally believe in the rule of law, and believe that police should never take matters in their own hands.  Activities like planting evidence should never be tolerated.  At the same time, I am willing to allow such things like who they framed and why to be taken into consideration at the time of sentencing.


    by Elusive Trope on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 2:12pm

    It is correct that I didn't read your comment with a 'beginners' mind', I have read your apologies for everything authority does too many times. So, while you say I took it wrong and assert that you actually believe,"police should never take matters in their own hands" you veer back pretty close to supporting them doing so in your last sentence.


    by A Guy Called LULU on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 2:28pm

    Taking extenuating circumstances into consideration when passing sentence on someone found guilty is about as liberal as one can get.  An otherwise law-abiding police officer who snaps after seeing a "known" drug dealer walk on the rare occasion they get enough evidence to drag him into court is different than a police officer who plants evidence on someone just because they don't like the color of their skin or their religion or whatever.  Guilty of the same crime, I would give the former a lighter sentence than the latter.  Both would be given sentences, just different ones. 

    Activities like planting evidence undermines the whole system, so to say, and shouldn't be tolerated if only for that reason.

    Along the same lines, if some guy, after learning the statue of limitation had run out, goes and puts a bullet into the head of a priest who had molested him many moon ago, I would take that past molestation into consideration on sentencing.  Even though I don't condone murder and believe people shouldn't be going around being judge, jury and executioner - especially since I am against the death penalty - and I'm sure you'd love watching me reconcile that with the use of predator drones ;)


    by Elusive Trope on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 3:20pm

    Given the amount of evidence the public has in this case, and given the historical tendencies in these matters, our response should be:

    we shouldn't be surprised if they were framed

    and

    we shouldn't be surprised if they were not framed.


    by Elusive Trope on Fri, 05/25/2012 - 9:08am

    Here is a well documented, well told story that relates to this blog.

    http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/471/the-convert

    The intro is worth listening but the meat of the story begins at the 8:40 mark.


    by A Guy Called LULU on Wed, 08/15/2012 - 6:28pm