Sting operationsFBI sting operations become more common

The Cleveland Five, accused of attempting to blow up a bridge // Source: chinapost.com.tw

Last week, HSNW reported on a successful FBI sting operation that led to the arrest of five self-described anarchists who plotted to blow up the Ohio 82 bridge over the Cuyahoga River.

The FBI had used a paid informant, who made contact with one of the five, Douglas Wright, at an Occupy Cleveland rally in October, and was present during the group’s discussions of planning violent action. The anarchists’ plans evolved during this time from toppling financial signs atop high-rise buildings in downtown Cleveland to, ultimately, destroying the bridge.

The group had determined that their most effective statement would be the destruction of the bridge, and were researching different explosive materials which they could make themselves. They settled on  C-4 plastic explosive, and the FBI informant suggested that he might be able to obtain a quantity of it. He supplied the group with a mock explosive that the conspirators then planted at the base of the bridge and drove off, attempting to detonate the fake C-4 by keying in a code in a transmission device.

This use of informants and undercover agent by the FBI is being questioned by defense attorneys and civil liberties advocates, who ask whether such operations are preventing crimes that could have resulted in scores of deaths, or creating a crime that would not have occurred without the FBI’s help.

In February, the FBI arrested a Moroccan man who set out to attack the U.S. Capitol armed with a suicide vest and an automatic handgun. Both the vest and weapon had been provided to him by the FBI, and both were harmless. As with the Cleveland five, the man had considered other targets, settling finally on the Capitol.

“Presently, the prevailing kind of view in the public is that the war on terror is so important that we’re going to condone aggressive government conduct,” said Geoffrey Mearns, a former assistant U.S. attorney for one of the Oklahoma City bombers prosecutors.

Mearns said the FBI and prosecutors are under intense pressure when deciding how to carry out an investigation because they know lives are at stake. “If they miscalculate, the consequences are devastating,” he said.

Michael German, former FBI undercover agent and now an ACLU attorney, says the bureau is now much more willing to provide encouragement and material to further a plot.

Many people are uncomfortable with the sting-type operations, saying that such investigations have the air of entrapment. An entrapment defense, however, is unlikely to stand up in court.

As in the case of the Portland Christmas tree lighting ceremony bombing attempt of 2010, FBI undercover agents supplied Mohemmed Osman Mohmmud with an inert explosive device and bomb.

In that case, Mohammud had selected the target, and had repeatedly affirmed his desire to go operational, that is, to conduct an attack. According to the FBI, Mohammud was informed that there would be children present, and he answered that his goal was to inflict mass casualties, regardless of the age of the victims.

Karen Greenberg, director of the Center on National Security at Fordham University School of Law, told Peter Krouse of the Plain Dealer that terrorism cases have high conviction rates but that public debate often focuses on who initiates the plot. Who, for instance, is the first to mention al-Qaeda or to embrace jihad? Who suggests the target or chooses the weapon?

With the foiled Cleveland bridge bombers, it appears from the FBI’s narrative that “almost everything started with the defendants themselves,” she said, although it is not so clear that they could have carried out the crime without the government’s help.

In the case of the Cleveland bridge bombing suspects, where the attack plan originated is of little consequence, since the accused bombers took what they believed were the explosives, planted them at their target site, and attempted to detonate them.