SECRECY & THE SECURITY STATE - page 17

According to Belgian intelligence officials, a spy operation conducted by the National Security Agency at a funeral of a suicide bomber led to the capture of a fugitive from last year’s Paris attacks. BuzzFeed News reported over the weekend that the arrest of Salah Abdeslam, the lone terrorist survivor of the Paris assault that killed 130 people last year, was facilitated by signals intelligence collected by the US spy agency on funeral-goers. Abdeslam was nabbed by authorities in March, days after the NSA gathered cellular…

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The Justice Department said that it will attempt to cease its use of for-profit prisons, in the wake of a scathing inspector general investigation that found privately-run detention centers are more dangerous and inefficiently run than public sector counterparts. Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates revealed the move on Thursday in a directive ordering department officials to either let corporate prisons’ contracts expire or to “substantially reduce” reliance on their services. The purpose of the initiative is “reducing—and ultimately ending—our use of privately operated prisons,” Yates…

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The Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) used an existing contract with a private prison company to reach a separate deal with the firm, without having to publicly solicit bids for a new detention center. ICE and the Corrections Corporation of America agreed on the four-year, $1 billion no-bid deal in 2014, to rapidly implement an Obama administration initiative designed to deter the arrival of asylum seekers from Central America. The terms of the agreement were reported on Monday in an investigation published by The…

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Lawyers representing a Navy shipman convicted of mishandling government secrets reminded a federal judge last week of the leniency recently afforded to Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, arguing that their client should receive similar considerations. Kristian Saucier could face more than six years in prison after he pleaded guilty to charges of unauthorized collection of defense secrets. He was found to be in possession of six photos depicting classified compartments of a US nuclear submarine that he once served aboard. The six images, Saucier’s lawyers…

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A report issued on Thursday by a Republican congressional task force confirmed that military leaders doctored intelligence analyses in order to paint a rosier picture of the war on the Islamic State (ISIL). The investigation confirms Daily Beast reporting first published last year on the integrity of those intelligence reports, which originated from US Central Command (CENTCOM)—the arm of the Pentagon that oversees operations in the Middle East, North Africa and Central Asia. Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), one of the task force’s members, noted that…

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A review of for-profit prisons by the Department of Justice’s Inspector General has concluded that the facilities are prone to more problems than their government-run counterparts. Examining several categories, including instances of contraband, lockdowns, and inmate discipline, the watchdog determined that private prisons ”incurred more safety and security incidents per capita than comparable BOP [Bureau of Prisons] institutions.” The report also knocked BOP officials for not conducting adequate oversight of for-profit facilities, noting that in just the last few years, “disturbances in several federal contract prisons…

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The Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) informed the public on Thursday that it would not be removing marijuana from its most dangerous classification of narcotics. The agency had been considering rescheduling the substance, after significant pressure from Capitol Hill. Its current listing as a “Schedule I” means the DEA considers cannabis among the most dangerous drugs in existence–substances with little to no medicinal value, like heroin and ecstasy. The DEA, however, did make a slight tweak in its regulations that will allow more institutions to conduct medical…

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The Justice Department confirmed that the Baltimore Police Department engages in racist practices and routinely violates the civil rights of those that their officers have ostensibly signed up to protect and serve. In a report published on Wednesday, the department said BPD operated in systematic violation of the First and Fourth Amendment, infringing upon residents’ rights to free speech, privacy and their due process. The Justice Department also noted that this was being done, disproportionately, to the black residents of Baltimore. The investigation also found…

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Baltimore County police did not want Korryn Gaines in contact with her Facebook audience when they served a warrant at her home last week. So they asked the company to deactivate her account. In the moments leading up to her death from police gunfire, Facebook complied. The deactivation of Gaines’ account cut her off from her only means of communicating with the public, leaving her 5 year-old son the only non-law enforcement witness to Gaines’s death. He was also wounded in the incident. It also…

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During a meeting with reporters on Wednesday, Homeland Security chief Jeh Johnson said that his department was “actively thinking about election security,” and considering granting voting systems new federal protections. Secretary Johnson’s comments, which were first reported by BuzzFeed News, suggest that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) could soon classify the myriad of voting machines in use across the nation as “critical infrastructure.” DHS currently identifies 16 critical infrastructure sectors in the US that receive enhanced cybersecurity assistance from the federal government. They include…

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