Tuesday, February 25, 2003

While the Wisdom of this Operation Is Questionable . . . the Possibility of a Court Order Redirecting Website Traffic is Troubling Indeed! Drug paraphernalia raids take down web sites. The US Justice Department has taken down more than a dozen web sites as part of a raid on stores selling pipes and bongs. Federal officials said the raids had yielded several tons worth of drug paraphernalia used both by suppliers to help produce drugs for resale and by users to conceal drugs. Investigators said the items - which included drug pipes hidden in school highlighters, soft-drinks cans and lipstick cases - would sell for tens of millions of dollars on the open market. The... [vigilant.tv] I, for one, will be interested to see what legal authority the Department of Justice relies on for this request.  8:22:05 PM    comment [] An All Too Frequent Problem of the Federal Law Enforcement Stats Game GAO finds DOJ terrorism statistics misleading. Following up an article from last year , the GAO has completed its investigation into allegations the US DoJ has overstated numbers of terrorist arrests. The GAO found that numbers were indeed inflated - 75% of "international terrorists" arrested in 2002 have since been reclassified as conventional criminals - but that the discrepencies were not deliberate. GAO did not suggest that DOJ was not deliberately trying to beef up its numbers, but rather that different... [vigilant.tv] This story reflects the constant presure felt by U.S. Attorney's Offices to have their caseloads reflect the "hot topic" crimes of the day.  These statistics are almost always over-inclusive whether the new trend is fighting terrorism, health care fraud or computer crimes.  The incentive, a feature that the GAO report apparently neglects to identify or discuss, is that many newly funded prosecutor positions are handed out by Main Justice in DC based upon current caseload stats, so if you have a significant number of terrorism cases your office is likely to get more bodies to prosecute such cases.  Moreover, once the new position is authorized it usually stays in place long after the "crisis" which caused its creation and funding.  9:48:43 AM    comment [] A Glimpse of New Orleans' Own Brand of Insanity During Carnival Season via The New York Times - Happy Mardi Gras! At Mardi Gras, a Catch and Fleeting Ecstasy. For as long as most people in New Orleans can recall, the catching of beads has been tangible proof of the party. By Rick Bragg. [New York Times: National] 9:21:36 AM    comment []

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