A new Justice Department audit report (07-20) confirms what many have suspected, that officials there have inflated terrorism statistics. But, the report also includes alarming revelations about mishandled databases that have disturbing implications for justice and homeland security.
Many cases of "terrorism" turned out to be falsely classified.
Federal prosecutors counted immigration violations, marriage fraud and drug trafficking among anti-terror cases in the four years after 9/11 even though no evidence linked them to terror activity, a Justice Department audit said Tuesday. (Associated Press).
But, that was just the tip of the iceberg of Justice Department mismanagement. Justice's Inspector General, Glenn Fine, also criticized the Department for sloppy record keeping that included numerous inaccuracies, with potentially serious consequences. Justice officials denied that the errors were intentional, but interestingly, there seemed to be a pattern of vigorously counting investigations and arrests combined with slothful reporting of the findings - which usually did not result in convictions.
The number of terrorism-related convictions was overstated because the FBI initially coded the investigative cases as terrorism-related when the cases were opened, but did not recode cases when no link to terrorism was established. (Audit Report 07-20)
The IG's report reveals a shocking lack of controls on the handling of data that conceivably could result in an innocent American citizen being arrested and possibly convicted, or perhaps denied a job based on an inaccurate FBI file.
We are concerned that EOUSA’s view of the anti-terrorism category permits criminal cases arising from virtually any federal law enforcement effort, including immigration violations or border enforcement activities, to be categorized as anti-terrorism regardless of the actual circumstances. (Audit Report 07-20)
Still graver questions are raised about the Justice Department's ability to thwart attacks from real terrorists.
The inaccurate reporting of the number of intelligence products issued occurred because no internal controls are in place for gathering and verifying the number of Intelligence Bulletins, Intelligence Assessments, and Intelligence Information Reports that have been posted to websites by the four FBI divisions. In addition, the FBI did not validate the accuracy of the information posted by the divisions to ensure that all the intelligence information products are posted. (Audit Report 07-20)
It probably is not surprising that the worst problems were found in the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys or EOUSA (AP). The forced resignations of seven U.S. attorneys currently has the Justice Department in hot water.
The statistics were inaccurately reported for various reasons, including that the components: (1) could not provide support for the numbers reported for the statistics; (2) could not provide support of the terrorism link used to classify statistics as terrorism-related; and (3) could not provide documentation to show that some items counted in the statistic reported occurred in the period reported or the evidence provided showed that some items counted in the statistic reported did not occur in the period reported. (AP)
Anyone who finds this report depressing probably won't want to read Mr. Fine's earlier report, assessing the Department's crisis preparedness.
"Rapid response to critical incidents ... is an essential function of the
Department of Justice," Inspector General Glenn A. Fine said in the 70-page report. "Critical incident response is also an integral part of the department's strategy for combating terrorism."
But, Mr. Fine said, the U.S. attorney's offices in the nation's 93 districts -- all of whom are responsible for developing plans to respond to major incidents -- are not adequately prepared to do so. (Washington Times)
If asked to comment on the findings, President Bush would no doubt respond, as he has on other occasions, that he is fighting a war in Iraq so that we won't have to fight the terrorists over here. But, as recent attacks and attempts have shown, there are enough terrorists in the world to fight in both places. We cannot, as a nation, afford the kind of mismanagement that has become epidemic in federal government.
