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DETROIT - A former federal agent who pleaded guilty to faking a marriage to gain U.S. citizenship and improperly searching FBI databases was sentenced Tuesday to pay $975 in fines and other fees, but will serve no prison time. U.S. District Court Judge Avern Cohn said Nada Nadim Prouty, 38, "erred in judgment" 19 years ago when she lied to enter the U.S. in 1989 from her native Lebanon, but has provided "exemplary service to the country" as a federal agent. Cohn also signed an order revoking Prouty's citizenship, but Prouty's attorney Thomas Cranmer said after the hearing she will...

HT: TradenCheese This is an excellent commentary by Judge Andrew Napolitano, who appears on FOXNews regularly. Please note the audio is a little lacking but you’ll have little problem hearing the words of truth. I do not know when this was first aired. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvu12z832Xc

Mortgage fraud schemes rose 31 percent last year and will likely keep rising in 2008, FBI says The agency said Tuesday that reports of suspected mortgage fraud rose 31 percent to 46,717 in fiscal 2007... That was up from 35,617 in the previous fiscal year. That number "is just the tip of the iceberg, reflecting only a small percentage of financial damage suffered by victims of mortgage fraud," Florida led the led the nation in mortgage fraud in 2007 for the second straight year, followed by Nevada, Michigan, California, Utah and Georgia.

A long-time friend and fundraiser of presidential hopeful Barack Obama was accused by prosecutors Monday of using his political clout to demand kickbacks, win government contracts and place associates in key state jobs.While Obama is not accused of any wrongdoing and has subsequently donated all the money raised by alleged influence-peddler Antoin "Tony" Rezko to charity, prosecutors have said that some of the kickbacks ended up in the Illinois Democratic senator's campaign coffers.Obama is also under fire for entering a land deal with Rezko in 2005 when it was widely known that the real estate developer was under federal scrutiny,...

The raid today at Agriprocessors, Inc. meat packing plant targeted individuals who were using stolen Social Security numbers. Officials say at least 300 have been arrested but that the number could go as high as 700. The raid was the largest of it's kind in Iowa according to Claude Arnold of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

The FBI announced Friday that an investigation into counterfeit network components made in China and sold to the U.S. government has recovered about 3,500 fake devices with a value of $3.5 million. The criminal probe, code-named Operation Cisco Raider, was prompted by concerns that counterfeit network components could give hackers access to government databases. But one U.S. official told Reuters that the components discovered by the FBI are not believed to have made government computer systems more vulnerable. The existence of the probe came to light after an unclassified FBI PowerPoint presentation in January on the agency's efforts to counter...

SAN DIEGO (AP) - The FBI has released surveillance video of a powerful pipe bomb explosion that shattered big windows at a federal courthouse and filled the lobby with smoke. FBI spokesman Darrell Foxworth says the agency hopes anyone with information about the explosion early Sunday feels compelled to contact investigators after seeing the video. The bomb caused significant damage to the lobby but no injuries, and forced the courthouse to close for one day. The FBI recovered more than 100 nails and shrapnel up to two blocks from the courthouse, Foxworth says. Investigators believe the bomb may be linked...

LOS ANGELES (AP) - The chairman of the Jewish Defense League were arrested in connection with a failed bombing plot, federal authorities said. Irv Rubin, 56, and a member of the militant group, Earl Krugel, 59, were booked early Wednesday at the federal Metropolitan Detention Center in Los Angeles, detention center spokeswoman Donna Davis said. The arrests late Tuesday were in connection with a bombing plot, said Thom Mrozek, a spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office. He would not describe the alleged scheme except to say, "The bombing was not carried out." Criminal charges should be filed later Wednesday, Mrozek ...

Excerpt - WASHINGTON -- Federal Bureau of Investigation agents raided the Office of Special Counsel here, seizing computers and documents belonging to the agency chief Scott Bloch and staff. More than a dozen FBI agents served grand jury subpoenas shortly after 10 a.m., shutting down the agency's computer network and searching its offices, as well as Mr. Bloch's home. Employees said the searches appeared focused on alleged obstruction of justice by Mr. Bloch during the course of an 2006 inquiry into his conduct in office. ~ snip ~

Two European business consultants have identified themselves to U.S. officials as the men who were being sought by the FBI after crew members and riders reported their unusual behavior aboard a Washington state ferry last summer.The men, both citizens of a European Union nation, appeared at a U.S. Embassy two weeks ago and identified themselves as the men pictured in photos released to the media last summer, according to a news release issued today by the FBI's Seattle field office. The release did not identify the men or the city where the embassy is located.

For over a year, we have been waging a relentless, nearly solitary battle in apprising the Congress and the American public about a billion dollar boondoggle and scandal: the lack of credible Arabic translators for our national security and intelligence agencies. As a result hundreds have been killed in Iraq from infiltration of our military and civilian intelligence agencies by agents of Islamist terrorists. Our FBI and CIA have been infiltrated by Muslim linguists who have successfully evaded polygraph tests and been able to pass on vital information to terror groups in the Middle East such as Hezbollah. Tens of...

FBI To Address Attacks Dear Pro-Troop Supporters:I have some great news to share with you!! Please also pass along this information to others who will appreciate the good news.As you know there has sadly been an increasing campaign of violence against military recruiting centers across the nation - conducted by anti-military radicals (who are erroneously referred to as "peace activists" by a sympathetic media). We at Move America Forward researched the vast array of these incidents and compiled them together in "The Sedition Report" which we provided to members of Congress and law enforcement.Today Move America Forward's legal team received...

Madness -- politically correct madness. The FBI showed it wasn't anti-Arab by hiring Nada Prouty, and she handsomely repaid them for it, too. Nada Nadim Prouty Update: "Fake citizen worked on major terror cases," by David Ashenfelter for the Detroit Free Press (thanks to Sr. Soph): Nada Prouty, the Lebanese immigrant who parlayed a sham marriage into U.S. citizenship and key jobs at the FBI and CIA, worked on several counter-terrorism investigations, including the 2000 bombing of the U.S.S. Cole in Yemen, her lawyer said in court documents Thursday. "Nada Nadim Prouty accepts full responsibility for her actions and is...

(English-language translation) Federal authorities arrested eight people this morning in relation to a fraud scheme in the [Puerto Rico] Department of Education, Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) spokesman Harry Rodríguez confirmed firsthand to "Notiuno in the Morning". According to Rodríguez, the Grand Jury's indictments come in response to irregularities in the handling of federal funds in that agency. However, he could not offer more details about the case since the indictments remain sealed. For his part, Teachers Federation President Rafael Feliciano assured Notiuno that one of the persons implicated in the scheme is a fundraiser for the Popular Democratic Party...

FBI files from 1976, recently made public under the Freedom of Information Act, confirm the connections between Weatherman, Havana, and Moscow. Weatherman [Weather Underground] leaders like Mark Rudd traveled illegally to Havana in 1968 to engage in terrorist training. There, camps set up by Soviet KGB Colonel Vadim Kotchergine were educating Westerners both in Marxist philosophy and urban warfare.

The FBI on Wednesday called for new legislation that would allow federal police to monitor the Internet for "illegal activity." The suggestion from FBI Director Robert Mueller, which came during a House of Representatives Judiciary Committee hearing, appears to go beyond a current plan to monitor traffic on federal-government networks. Mueller seemed to suggest that the bureau should have a broad "omnibus" authority to conduct monitoring and surveillance of private-sector networks as well. The surveillance should include all Internet traffic, Mueller said, "whether it be .mil, .gov, .com--whichever network you're talking about." (See the transcript of the hearing.)

FrontPageMag.com April 24, 2008 Virginia Muslim police sergeant who tipped off jihadist gets probation Let's see. He hindered a counter terrorism case, may have tipped off the jihadist more than once, and checked to see if his own name was on the terror watch list. For that he gets six months probation, from a judge who clearly has no idea whatsoever of the larger issues involved in the case. Will he retain his job with the police? Is anyone concerned that he may again aid jihadists who are waging war against the United States? Is anyone with any influence asking...

Some months ago, my contacts in the defense industry had alerted me to a startling development that has escalated to the point of near-panick in nearly all corners of Government security and IT infrastructure. The very-real concern, being investigated by the FBI, is that either the Chinese government or Chinese hackers (or both) have had the benefit of undetectable back-doors into highly secure government and military computer networks for months, perhaps years. The cause: a high-number of counterfeit Cisco routers and switches installed in nearly all government networks that experienced upgrades and/or new units within the past 18 months.

WASHINGTON -- FBI Director Robert Mueller on Wednesday recalled warning the Justice Department and the Pentagon that some U.S. interrogation methods used against terrorists might be inappropriate, if not illegal. Mueller's comments came under pointed questioning by House Democrats demanding to know if the FBI tried to stop interrogations in 2002 that critics define as torture. Mueller said the FBI does not use coercive techniques when questioning suspects or witnesses, and he reportedly pulled his agents out of CIA or military interrogations several years ago to protect them from legal consequences. FBI protocol "wouldn't engage in torture," said Rep. Stephen...

Bill Ayers' brother, Rick Ayers, is lashing out at Hillary Clinton, accusing her of "McCarthyism" for making an issue of rival Barack Obama's links to Chicago professor Bill Ayers during this week's Democratic presidential debate. "The fact that she would drag up this pathetic red herring about Obama's alleged ties to so-called terrorist Bill Ayers (my brother!) brings her right down to the level of Fox News and the National Enquirer," blogged Rick Ayers, a California high school teacher and author. "This is the most base version of McCarthyism," he wrote. "Obama should have taken a page from Joseph Welch...

NEAR WACO - 15-years-ago Saturday, a huge fire ended a 51-day stand-off near Waco. It all took place at the Branch Davidian Compound. The standoff started with a government investigation into illegal possession of firearms and explosives. The Feds tried to enter the compound and were met with gunfire. By the end of the day, the compound was burned to the ground. 80 people were killed, including 22 children and four ATF agents.

WASHINGTON -- The FBI is grappling with growing numbers of public corruption cases and a surge in mortgage fraud investigations, FBI Director Robert Mueller said Thursday, wondering aloud whether Americans are "becoming more crooked." In a speech to the American Bar Association, Mueller asked the assembled defense lawyers for help in "creating a culture of integrity" by reporting evidence of wrongdoing by politicians and corporate executives alike. "Anyone who follows the news these days and sees repeated references to corporate fraud and public corruption might think the nation is in the midst of a moral crisis," Mueller told the defense...

At 5:59 a.m., SAGE telephones the Davidians, notifying them of an imminent tear-gas assault. SAGE reads a message over the loudspeaker, advising the Davidians that they are under arrest and should come out. At 6:02 a.m., two FBI combat engineering vehicles, or CEVs, begin inserting gas into the compound through spray nozzles attached to a boom. At 6:04 a.m., the Davidians start shooting, and the FBI begin deploying Bradley vehicles to insert ferret rounds through the windows. At 6:31, the HRT reports that the entire building is being gassed. At about 7 a.m., RENO and senior advisors go to the...

Federal authorities issued a flurry of subpoenas across the city yesterday as they launched a grand jury investigation of disability abuse in the Boston Fire Department, including whether dozens of firefighters faked on-the-job injuries to significantly enhance their pensions, according to several officials briefed on the probe.

On Friday, the government filed this statement of the facts in its memorandum in support of its motion for summary judgment in a civil rights and Privacy Act lawsuit brought by Dr. Steve Hatfill. “The anthrax attacks occurred in October 2001. Public officials, prominent members of the media, and ordinary citizens were targeted by this first bio-terrorist attack on American soil. Twenty-two persons were infected with anthrax; five died. At least 17 public buildings were contaminated. The attacks wreaked havoc on the U.S. postal system and disrupted government and commerce, resulting in economic losses estimated to exceed one billion dollars....

FBI chief blames Britain’s laws for the ‘dark hole’ in terror intelligence 13th April 2008 The war on terror is being hindered by restrictive British law which has created a "dark hole of intelligence", the director of the FBI has claimed. Robert Mueller, America's top counter-terrorist official, said in an exclusive interview that he sometimes felt "frustration" at MI5 and Scotland Yard's inability to obtain critical information from suspects. He blamed Britain's banning of plea-bargaining – which, in America, means suspects can receive much lighter sentences in return for revealing everything they know about other members of their cell and...

FBI head predicts al-Qaeda defeat By Frank Gardner Security correspondent, BBC News Robert Mueller outlined what he sees as a three-tiered threat from al-Qaeda The head of the FBI has said he believes the West can achieve victory over al-Qaeda within three-and-a-half years. Robert Mueller described how his organisation is working closely with British intelligence to confront ever-more-complex plots. Flanked by broad-shouldered security men with tell-tale bulges beneath their suits, the director of the FBI gave a rare public address in London. As head of one of 16 US intelligence agencies, Mr Mueller is at the forefront of preventing a...

ATF added another weapon to its gang-fighting arsenal Nov. 28 with the formal opening of a new facility in Northern Virginia that will house 80 intelligence analysts, agents, prosecutors and support personnel — all from different agencies — and all working together to investigate and dismantle the most violent gangs in the United States. “Coordination has brought us success in the past, and can yield even more in the future,” said ATF Acting Director Michael Sullivan, speaking during the formal opening of the new facility. The new site brings together two separate gang deterrence units — the National Gang Intelligence...

(English-language translation) Archbishop of San Juan Roberto González Nieves confirmed to EL VOCERO that agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) interviewed him about two visits the religious leader made to the President of the Boricua Popular Army Los Macheteros, Filiberto Ojeda, while the latter was in hiding. González indicated that some four or five months after Ojeda's death, two FBI agents visited him at the Bishop's Residence in Old San Juan. During the September 23, 2005 [FBI] raid on the Machetero leader's residence in Hormigueros, the authorities confiscated a book the Archbishop gave him and which was dedicated...

SONNY Bono, former husband and singing partner of superstar Cher, was clubbed to death by hitmen on the orders of drug and weapons dealers who feared he was going to expose them, a former FBI agent claims. Ted Gunderson, now a private investigator, has told the US Globe tabloid that Bono, who served as mayor of Palm Springs for four years, did not die after hitting a tree on a Nevada ski slope in January 1998 as everyone believed. "It's nonsense for anyone to now try to suggest that Bono died after crashing into a tree. There's zero evidence in...

FBI wiretaps have "given us the most powerful and persuasive source of all for seeing how utterly selfless Martin Luther King was," as a civil rights leader, according to a leading civil rights scholar. "You see him being intensely self-critical. King really and truly believed that he was there to be of service to others. This was not a man with any egomaniacal joy of being a famous person, or being a leader," said Pulitzer Prize-winning scholar David Garrow in a recent interview with CNN. Hoping to prove the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was under the influence of Communists,...

For nearly seven years, the nation has turned its terror focus on Al Qaeda and the hunt for Usama bin Laden. But there is a domestic terror threat that federal officials still consider priority No. 1 — eco-terrorism. The torching of luxury homes in the swank Seattle suburb of Woodinville earlier this month served as a reminder that the decades-long war with militant environmentalists on American soil has not ended. "It remains what we would probably consider the No. 1 domestic terrorism threat, because they have successfully continued to conduct different types of attacks in and around the country," said...

Monday, 31 March 2008 ICE-led probe results in criminal and civil forfeitures of more than $1 million PHOENIX - A federal judge has sentenced the last of the 13 owners and former owners of six motels in Mesa, Ariz., who were indicted after a probe by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) revealed they were using their businesses to harbor illegal aliens in support of organized human smuggling. U.S. District Judge Frederick J. Martone imposed sentences of probation, fines and forfeiture on the final two defendants in the case March 26. The owners of the motels on Mesa's Main Street...

March 31, 2008 Group Tied to Pakistani Terrorist to Parade in Binghamton, NY Instead of those plastic toy swords sold at normal parades, they will be selling replicas of the one used by Mohammed to behead infidels.... The city of Binghamton, New York granted a group with ties to Islamic terrorist Sheikh Mubarek Ali Gilani a permit to publicly celebrate Milad-un-Nabi, or Muhammed’s birthday, in the streets of Binghamton this Saturday. The Muslims of the Americas (MOA), the name used by Jamaat ul Fuqra, or “Community of the Impoverished,” was issued a permit for a public celebration that includes a...

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to step into a legal fight between the Justice Department and a member of Congress who has been indicted on bribery charges. The court declined to review an appeals court ruling that the FBI reviewed legislative documents in the office of Rep. William Jefferson, D-La., in violation of the Constitution. Jefferson has pleaded not guilty to charges of soliciting more than $500,000 in bribes while using his office to broker business deals in Africa. His trial has been delayed indefinitely. While the Bush administration asked the Supreme Court to intervene, Attorney General Michael Mukasey...

By T.J. Pignataro - News Staff Reporter 03/26/08 A public alert was issued early this evening by Buffalo Police, warning that a gang could be staging rear-end collisions tonight on area roadways and then attacking drivers as part of an initiation ritual. Commissioner H. McCarthy Gipson called an emergency news conference at police headquarters just before 6:30 p.m. to make the announcement. He said police received "credible information" late this afternoon suggesting that the initiation ritual could involve gang member recruits intentionally causing rear-end collisions and then robbing or assaulting the other driver. Gipson suggested motorists be aware of their...

March 26, 2008 The FBI is now involved in the theft of a car after it was found in Los Lunas with an explosive device and Iraqi currency inside.FBI agents say that they have ruled out terrorism. The car was reported stolen last week. After the theft, the car’s owner was fueling his motorcycle when he spotted his stolen car. “While he was refueling his motorcycle, low and behold, the vehicle that he had reported stolen that belongs to him happened to pull into the gas station area also,” said Los Lunas Police Captain Charles Nuanes. The car’s owner pulled...

KENNER, La. — The cake had been served and the children were jumping up and down in a big, inflatable castle when the birthday party turned to bedlam. Clarence McGraw's jaw dropped as he saw the visitors coming, guns drawn. The screaming began. Children ran everywhere in the courtyard of the low-income apartment complex; adults fell to the ground. Bullets flew. The killers wounded three youngsters, but for reasons police can't explain, it was 19-year-old McGraw they were after.

The FBI has agreed to give NYPD brass direct access to top-secret anti-terror intelligence - and Washington has at last let the NYPD station a deputy inspector in the National Counterterrorism Center. Here we have smart steps toward maintaining safety for New York and the nation. Congratulations to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly, Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence David Cohen, FBI Director Robert Mueller and Mark Mershon, head of the city's FBI team. By allowing the NYPD to establish a secure room - a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility - at Police Headquarters, the FBI opened the door for department brass to review...

Waist Deep In The Big Media by: Justin Benedict, March 26, 2008 Schools are his favorite venue but media darling Pete Seeger may want to pass on more than folk songs to the next generation. “The Federal Bureau of Investigation pursued Pete Seeger until the only job he could get was singing to kids,” said David King Dunaway, author of How Can I Keep Him From Singing: Pete Seeger. “They never thought there’d be a problem with Pete Seeger singing to six-year-olds.” “Little did they know that out of that came not a subversive movement, but an American folk music...

The appearance of nuclear weapons materials on the black market is a growing global concern, and it is crucial that the United States reinforce its team of nuclear forensics experts and modernize its forensics tools to prepare for or respond to a possible nuclear terrorist attack. Large quantities of nuclear materials are inadequately secured in several countries, including Russia and Pakistan. Since 1993, there have been more than 1,300 incidents of illicit trafficking of nuclear materials, including plutonium and highly enriched uranium, both of which can be used to develop an atomic bomb. And these are only the incidents we...

By Judi McLeod Tuesday, March 25, 2008 In an effort to provide them a fair trial, the Canadian government is seeking a limited publication ban on the identities of the adults charged with belonging to the so-called “Toronto 18” group. The identity of the youth charged with belonging to a homegrown terror cell is already protected under the Young Criminal Justice Act. The trial for the youth gets underway in a Brampton court today. Almost unheard of since they were nabbed in a foiled undercover operation to kidnap and behead members of Parliament, among other things on June 2, 2006,...

FBI agents in Seattle are examining a tattered parachute found recently in north Clark County, looking for evidence that it might have been used by legendary skyjacker D.B. Cooper. The 'chute was found by children living near the center of the jump zone where the skyjacker bailed out of the 727 jetliner with $200,000 in cash in 1971, never to be heard from again. Larry Carr, a special agent in the FBI's Seattle office, said the property owner was putting in a road on the site and his tractor blade uncovered some cloth. The children pulled out the canopy until...

Authorities are awaiting identification of the remains of three more bodies found in Iraq, a U.S. law enforcement official said Tuesday. Sources say the remains are those of more missing contractors; the news comes a day after the remains of two kidnapped contractors were identified. Among the missing are Paul Johnson Reuben of Buffalo, Minnesota. The others still missing are Jonathon Cote, of Getzville, N.Y.; Joshua Munns of Redding, Calif.; and Bert Nussbaumer of Vienna, Austria. A finger from each was received by the military recently. Four other kidnapped Western contractors have been missing for more than a year. The...

60s Needle in Academic Haystack by: Malcolm A. Kline, March 25, 2008 Finding a front-page 60s radical four decades after the fact is a bit like finding a needle in an academic haystack: You just have to stumble upon the institution of higher learning that the professional protestor sought shelter in. Case in point: Mark Rudd of Students for a Democratic Society. We unearthed this pop culture relic thanks to Jonah Goldberg’s invaluable book, Liberal Fascism. “Today his is a math teacher at a community college in Albuquerque, New Mexico,” Goldberg relates. “Rudd has expressed remorse for his violent youthful...

CAIR Exposed: Part 1 As IAP Offshoot, CAIR Followed Pro-Hamas Agenda From the Start by Steven Emerson IPT News March 24, 2008FEATURE STORY   From the Hamas ties of its founders in 1994 to its solicitous stance toward accused terrorists today, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) has demonstrated that its actual mission is far removed from the civil rights advocacy it claims to pursue. Still standing as perhaps the clearest evidence of CAIR's insidious role, two key leaders of the group attended a 1993 meeting in Philadelphia called by Hamas members and supporters to devise a strategy for torpedoing...

The FBI has recently adopted a novel investigative technique: posting hyperlinks that purport to be illegal videos of minors having sex, and then raiding the homes of anyone willing to click on them. Undercover FBI agents used this hyperlink-enticement technique, which directed Internet users to a clandestine government server, to stage armed raids of homes in Pennsylvania, New York, and Nevada last year. The supposed video files actually were gibberish and contained no illegal images. A CNET News.com review of legal documents shows that courts have approved of this technique, even though it raises questions about entrapment, the problems of...

FBI investigates noose at business Sea Ray Boats says man who hung rope has been fired By Jim Balloch Saturday, March 22, 2008 The FBI is investigating an incident at Sea Ray Boats' Riverview plant in which a white employee placed a noose where it was seen by a black employee. "They were contacted (Wednesday) by the FBI concerning this matter," said Dan Kubera, spokesman for the boat manufacturer's parent company, Brunswick Corp. of Lake Forest, Ill. "We will be meeting with the agency and cooperating in the investigation." Also, Kubera said, the company was notified March 17 that a...

WASHINGTON — In the days immediately after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, members of President Bush’s war cabinet declared that it would be impossible to deter the most fervent extremists from carrying out even more deadly terrorist missions with biological, chemical or nuclear weapons. Since then, however, administration, military and intelligence officials assigned to counterterrorism have begun to change their view. After piecing together a more nuanced portrait of terrorist organizations, they say there is reason to believe that a combination of efforts could in fact establish something akin to the posture of deterrence, the strategy that helped protect...

By Rowan Scarborough, Insight An American Muslim group identified as an unindicted co-conspirator in a criminal terrorism case is being used by the FBI to train its agents about Islam. The FBI declined to respond to Insight’s questions about this seeming disconnect, as one of the pre-eminent anti-terrorist research centers in America is set to release an extensive report on the same prominent U.S. Muslim group, accusing the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) of being a foe, rather than an ally, in the war on terror. The 10-part report on CAIR from The Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT), led by...