The US government is prosecuting Thomas Drake for alleged leaks of classified information related to the NSA's domestic surveillance.
One step is to review evidence before trial to decide whether that evidence is admissible. The court publishes its conclusions in a court order.
However, the court disclosed an FBI agent's name who provided Grand Jury testimony That Agent's name matches the name on the FBI hockey team.
For purposes of witness impeachment, it's unclear whether the defense plans to request the audio transcripts to establish whether the FBI agents -- while playing hockey in non-secured areas -- discussed any relevant, national security information.
EW pointed to the court ruling on various documents for the Drake trial.
One method to impeach a witness is to review the statements, and then provide information attacking their credibility:
- Were any of the hockey players aware of any comments the FBI Special Agent made regarding any testimony before the grand jury?
- Did the agent improperly disclose information related to any classified activity, testimony, or operation?
- Were any agents on the hockey team -- or opposing team members -- aware of any statements made by the witness made outside secured areas?
It will also be interesting to compare the agent's hockey schedule with the dates, schedule, and timelines the agent provided to the grand jury:
- Did the agent accurately report information about schedules, timelines, or events
- Did the FBI agent -- as a hockey player -- engage in travel, games, practice, or hockey-related team-events while he -- allegedly -- stated he was doing "other things" related to national security
- Are there any issues related to travel times, travel locations, or other destinations within the FBI agent's disclosed hockey-related activities that do not reconcile with those events he presented to the grand jury?
Usually FBI agents make statements within an affidavit related to their experience. These statements give a jury or court information related to their reliability.
However, of interest to the court and public are comparisons between the agent's official record, and the times the agent spent practicing for hockey.
- is there a logical link between the academic testing results at the FBI academy, and the stated hockey practice times
- Did the agent travel to attend hockey games-practices-events near key testing dates while attending specialized training at the FBI academy
- How did the agent's travel-related-to-hockey overlap, compare, or co-incide with TDY order dates on official FBI travel, schedule airline, or other government funded transportation?
- Did the FBI agent -- while traveling on any FBI "official" business -- also used government funded vehicles/rented transportation to provide assistance, travel assistance, or transportation to any person not connected with the official hockey activities?
- When did the named agent attend the Potomac officer's club; and how do these travel and event dates compare with the key intelligence meetings of personnel associated with CALEA and NSA-CIA connected counter intelligence personnel assigned to the Department of Justice?
- Is it DOJ's official position that the FBI agent listed within the affidavit has no connection with any of the telecoms linked with the NSA's domestic surveillance?
References
Page 10 of 12, at 31. "The Court finds that this document, known as the Grand Jury Testimony of Special Agent Ethan Andreas, is relevant and may be used during cross-examination of relevant witnesses."
Recommendations
Consider the FBI agent's disclosed games, and compare the travel-practice schedules with the dates provided in the grand jury testimony.
Review the audio tapes of the games to search for recordings related to the disclosure of sensitive information in non-secured areas.
Ask for the Federal News Radio (audio) out-takes from the interviews, games, and event reporting. Seek court approval to conduct specialized audio analysis to remove or amplify information, or voices.
Focus on the FBI hockey schedule to focus on the non-secured federal facilities where the hockey games occurred; and competing team's media coverage. For example, DoD may have recorded information of the FBI's hockey game against the Marine Corps at Quanito, VA.
Compare the FBI agent's official schedule with is TDY orders, his game schedule, and the times-distances related to mileage on any requested travel reimbursement to establish a center-of-gravity analysis for the agent's activity; then compare that summary chart with the key dates within the FBI agent's Grand Jury affidavit/testimony to identify irreconcilable discrepancies.