FBI Faulted for Failing to Support Wiretap Applications with Evidence

  WASHINGTON -- The FBI is trying to comply with an unusual court order to turn over evidence on its national security wiretaps after an inspector general’s report found lapses in the agency’s evidence-gathering.

   The secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court told the FBI on Friday to reveal the names of 29 targets of its surveillance for suspected terrorism and espionage. The agency also must disclose evidence showing whether it met federal standards for the wiretaps.

   The court order follows a Justice Department’s inspector general’s report faulting the FBI for sometimes obtaining wiretap warrants without the evidence required to prove they are needed.

   The FBI is supposed to follow the “Woods Procedures,” which require that each fact listed in an application for a surveillance warrant is supported by documentation.

   Instead, at least 25 of the applications demonstrated “apparent errors or inadequately supported facts," according to a recently released audit by Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz.

   "We do not have confidence that the FBI has executed its Woods Procedures in compliance with FBI policy," Horowitz wrote in his report.

   Nevertheless, some national security surveillance warrants may have been granted by federal judges despite a lack of evidence, according to investigators.

   The problematic wiretap warrants are raising alarms about whether innocent persons were victims of Fourth Amendment privacy violations. They also complicate the FBI’s credibility for obtaining warrants to investigate international threats.

   In general, the persons being monitored by wiretaps were the target of counterterrorism and counterintelligence investigations.

   The most high profile among them was former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, who the FBI was watching as part of the Justice Department’s investigation into Russian influence in the 2016 presidential election.

For more information, contact The Legal Forum (www.legal-forum.net) at email: [email protected] or phone: 202-479-7240.