Tag: fbi

Senator Reveals How FBI “Improperly” Halted Investigation Into Biden Family Corruption

Republican Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley announced Wednesday that there is evidence that the FBI and the DOJ attempted to shut down investigative activity into the Biden family and initiated a coverup of “criminal information” by labeling it “foreign disinformation.”

Grassley presented the findings in a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and FBI Director Christopher Wray, noting that “This letter is based on years of investigation, including the provision of information, records, and allegations from multiple Justice Department whistleblowers.”

The Senator further noted that the findings “indicate there is — and has been — an effort among certain Justice Department and FBI officials to improperly delay and stop full and complete investigative activity into the Biden family, including but not limited to FD-1023s referencing the Biden family.”

“As just one initial example, I’ve been made aware that at one point in time the FBI maintained over 40 Confidential Human Sources that provided criminal information relating to Joe Biden, James Biden, and Hunter Biden,” he continued.

“It’s been alleged that the basis for shutting the investigative activity down was an August 2020 assessment created by FBI Supervisory Intelligence Analyst Brian Auten,” Grassley added, further noting “That assessment was used by an FBI HQ team to improperly discredit negative Hunter Biden information as disinformation and caused investigative activity to cease.”

The Senator goes on to detail how the FBI used Auten’s assessment and other briefings to discredit bribery and corruption allegations as “foreign disinformation.” 

Grassley alleges that the “partisan media” and Congressional Democrats then cited the FBI’s assertions as a way of stymying his investigation into the Bidens.

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FBI Report Says 3 In 10 Drug Arrests Are For Marijuana, But Agency’s Inconsistent Data Hinders Policy Analysis

Arrests for marijuana made up nearly a third of all drug arrests in the United States in 2022, according to a newly released report from the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). As with last year’s report, however, inconsistencies in the data and recent changes to the agency’s methodology make it difficult to draw year-to-year comparisons or meaningful conclusions about cannabis and broader drug enforcement trends.

The data, according to FBI, comes from more than 11 million criminal offenses reported to the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program, which is submitted by 13,293 law enforcement agencies and 2,431 other agencies whose jurisdictions comprise more than 90 percent of the country’s population.

“Of the 18,884 state, county, city, university and college, and tribal agencies eligible to participate in the UCR Program, 15,724 agencies submitted data in 2022,” the bureau said in a press release about its annual 2022 Crime in the Nation statistics.

Because not all agencies provide data for the complete reporting periods, FBI explains in a methodology section of its website, the bureau calculates estimated crime numbers, essentially extrapolating “by following a standard estimation procedure using the data provided.” In terms of total reported arrests for “drug abuse violations,” for example, FBI said there were 766,595 arrests. The estimated number of arrests for drug abuse violations, by contrast, is 907,958.

Those numbers, however, aren’t consistent throughout the FBI report. In a section on arrests by region, FBI said there were 726,746 total drug arrests in 2022—nearly 40,000 fewer than its top-level number. In an analysis of  historical trends, meanwhile, FBI reported just 633,576 drug arrests in 2022. A section on racial breakdowns says there were 714,442 drug abuse violations.

Other sections list “drug/narcotic offenses” for the year at 1,459,460, the number of arrestees for drug/narcotic offenses at 787,347 and the total number of drug/narcotics offenders at 1,755,788. The agency further said there were 902,482 crimes involving a person’s suspected use of drugs other than alcohol in 2022.

FBI’s press office did not immediately respond to an email from Marijuana Moment requesting clarification on the conflicting numbers.

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FBI TARGETS MUSLIMS AND PALESTINIANS IN WAKE OF HAMAS ATTACK, CIVIL RIGHTS ADVOCATES WARN

FEDERAL LAW ENFORCEMENT agents have questioned and detained Palestinian nationals and made visits to mosques in the wake of Hamas’s attack on Israel, according to civil rights advocates.

Abed Ayoub, executive director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee, or ADC, said that his organization has fielded multiple reports of individuals and mosques being visited by the FBI this week. The Stop LAPD Spying Coalition, a police accountability group, also said it had received reports of federal agents intimidating Palestinians and their supporters. 

The interactions are reminiscent of surveillance and targeting of Muslim and Arab communities in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, and Ayoub told The Intercept that they are contributing to a resurgence of fear among Muslim communities. “Like, ‘Oh my god, this is happening again, how are we going to protect ourselves?’”

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Top government official bought prostitutes, schmoozed with foreign national: Investigation

A federal investigation has confirmed that a top-level FBI official associated with a foreign national and massage parlor owner paid for prostitutes “multiple” times before resigning and apparently ducking criminal charges.

The Department of Justice inspector general said that the former “senior level” official received “sexual favors” at a number of massage parlors while employed by the agency.

What’s more, the official did not tell the FBI of their relationship with the “foreign national” as required.

The investigation did not identify the former official or even the city the affair took place in.

Despite facing a long list of potential crimes, the inspector general said that since the suspect retired before the audit confirmed the charges, “federal and state criminal prosecution was declined.”

Senior-level federal officials earn as much as $203,000 a year. It is unclear why no charges were ever filed.

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‘You just broke my neck’ — Man accuses jailer of assault, FBI investigating

When Jeff Fry walked into the Lorain County jail on May 12, he was facing a misdemeanor bench warrant. He had no idea he’d leave the facility on a stretcher with permanent injuries.

“My head snapped back and that was it,” said Fry as he sat with his left arm in a sling, outside a friend’s home.

Fry said he spent two weeks in the hospital and another four months in a nursing facility recovering from what happened inside the jail that day.

His lawyer said Fry’s injuries included a broken neck and permanent spinal cord damage.

Now the FBI is investigating, and Fry’s lawyer is preparing a lawsuit, but as far as News 5 investigators could tell, no discipline was ever meted out, and the officer responsible is still on the job.

The 58-year-old Fry said he doesn’t remember much of the incident with a corrections officer that led to the injuries, but said he didn’t deserve what happened that day.

The emotions it brings up were evidenced by the tears that welled up in his eyes when asked about it.

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FBI Form Reveals They Knew New York Post’s Hunter Biden Laptop Story Was Real Ahead of 2020 Election

The FBI knew the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop featured in the New York Post’s reporting ahead of the 2020 presidential election were real, according to a newly released FBI FD-302 form summarizing the bureau’s interview with Hunter Biden’s former business associate, Tony Bobulinski.

The FBI interviewed Bobulinski on Oct. 23, 2020 after the New York Post’s story contained emails from the Hunter Biden laptop archive Bobulinski was copied on, the FD-302 form states. Bobulinski told the FBI he knew the emails were legitimate and had records of the emails on multiple cell phones, the form asserts.

“In addition, the New York Post recently published HUNTER BIDEN emails in which BOBULINSKI was copied. BOBULINSKI’s name was not redacted from the published emails, which put his name in the public domain and caused significant concern for his family’s safety,” the document reads. The FD-302 form’s contents were first reported by the New York Post.

“Nonetheless, BOBULINSKI was aware that the emails published by the New York Post were legitimate because BOBULINSKI was copied on them and had records of the emails on his own cellular devices,” the document adds.

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FBI Denies Targeting Trump Supporters Ahead of 2024 Election

On Thursday, the FBI denied reports that it is targeting Trump supporters ahead of the 2024 presidential elections. 

Newsweek reported Wednesday that the FBI had created a category to evaluate threats known as anti-government and anti-authority violent extremism, which encompasses individuals who are deemed as threats, but don’t fall under anarchist, militia or sovereign citizen groups. 

According to the outlet, more than a dozen current and former anonymous government officials said that the program primarily targets supporters of former President Donald Trump.

In a statement, the FBI denied the existence of this new designation, contesting the report and claiming it was false.  

“Any allegation that the FBI targets individuals solely for their political beliefs is categorically false,” an FBI spokesperson said. “The FBI investigates those who commit acts of violence or threaten violence, and we do not take action based on political belief or any First Amendment protected activity.”

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FBI Issues Warning About Newly Discovered Pedophilic, Satanist Extortion Cult Targeting Children Online

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has issued a warning about a newly discovered pedophilic, Satanist extortion cult targeting children online.

The cult uses platforms including Roblox, Discord, Twitch, Soundcloud, and Telegram to find new victims.

The FBI said in their public notice that the cult uses many names, including 676, 764, CVLT, Court, Kaskar, Harm Nation, Leak Society, and H3ll, but “continuously evolve and form subgroups under different monikers.”

“To gain access to a majority of these groups, prospective members are required to live-stream or upload videos depicting their minor victims harming animals or committing self-harm, suicide, murder, or other acts of violence,” the FBI said. “The key motivators of these groups are to gain notoriety and rise in status within their groups.”

The group was discovered after police in New York arrested a 23-year-old named Angel Almeida on gun charges and began investigating his social media posts. Items found in his apartment included books pertaining to the Order of Nine Angles, and a flag bearing the insignia of an American O9A offshoot, the Tempel ov Blood.

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FBI Creates ‘MAGA’ Extremist Category, Targets Trump Supporters Ahead Of 2024 Election

The Biden FBI has ‘quietly created a new category of extremists that it seeks to track and counter: Donald Trump’s army of MAGA followers’ ahead of the 2024 election, according to prolific (and well connected) anti-war journalist and political commentator, William Arkin, who has previously reported on the FBI’s efforts to “Fight MAGA Terrorism.”

In a Wednesday Newsweek article, Arkin reveals that the vast majority of FBI investigations into “anti-government” activities are of Trump supporters.

“The FBI is in an almost impossible position,” a current FBI official told Arkin, who added that the agency’s stated intent is stopping a repeat of January 6th type incidents (which was riddled with feds), while balancing the Constitutional right of Americans to protest the government “Especially at a time when the White House is facing Congressional Republican opposition claiming that the Biden administration has ‘weaponized’ the Bureau against the right wing, it has to tread very carefully,” the official continued.

Newsweek spoke to over a dozen current or former government officials who specialize in terrorism in a three-month investigation to understand the current domestic-security landscape and to evaluate what President Joe Biden‘s administration is doing about what it calls domestic terrorism. Most requested anonymity because they were not authorized to talk publicly, were reluctant to stray into partisan politics or feared the repercussions of speaking frankly.

Newsweek has also reviewed secret FBI and Department of Homeland Security data that track incidents, threats, investigations and cases to try to build a better picture. While experts agree that the current partisan environment is charged and uniquely dangerous (with the threat not only of violence but, in the most extreme scenarios, possibly civil war), many also question whether “terrorism” is the most effective way to describe the problem, or that the methods of counterterrorism developed over the past decade in response to Al-Qaeda and other Islamist groups constitute the most fruitful way to craft domestic solutions.

We would note that an FBI whistleblower in March claimed that the agency pressured him to inflate domestic terrorism figures against conservatives, and that the agency created a specific threat tag for pro-lifers “THREATSCOTUS2022” following the leaked Supreme Court opinion on abortion (and not a threat tag for the violent leftists who threatened SCOTUS justices?).

The FBI told Newsweek in a statement that: “The threat posed by domestic violent extremists is persistent, evolving, and deadly. The FBI’s goal is to detect and stop terrorist attacks, and our focus is on potential criminal violations, violence and threats of violence. Anti-government or anti-authority violent extremism is one category of domestic terrorism, as well as one of the FBI’s top threat priorities,” adding “We are committed to protecting the safety and constitutional rights of all Americans and will never open an investigation based solely on First Amendment protected activity, including a person’s political beliefs or affiliations.”

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FBI interviewed individuals who accuse Amy Coney Barrett faith group of abuse

The FBI has interviewed several individuals who have alleged they were abused by members of the People of Praise (PoP), a secretive Christian sect that counts conservative supreme court justice Amy Coney Barrett as a lifelong member, according to sources familiar with the matter.

The individuals were contacted following a years-long effort by a group called PoP Survivors, who have called for the South Bend-based sect to be investigated for leaders’ handling of sexual abuse allegations. The body, which has 54 members, has alleged that abuse claims were routinely mishandled or covered up for decades in order to protect the close-knit faith group.

It is not clear whether the FBI has launched a formal investigation into the PoP.

The Guardian has confirmed that at least five individuals were contacted by the FBI and four gave detailed accounts to agents of abusive behavior they allegedly experienced or witnessed. Individuals spoke to the Guardian on the condition of anonymity and said they believed the FBI interviews were part of an initial inquiry.

One woman who was interviewed by agents from Minneapolis, Minnesota, said she received an update last week and was told by agents that the investigation into her own claims, which involved allegations of sexual abuse by a teacher, had been closed. The woman told the Guardian that news had left her disappointed and defeated, and full of “a lot of questions”, because the agents had seemed interested in pursuing the matter.

A spokesperson for PoP Survivors said: “We urge the FBI to use their power to unearth the long-standing pattern of child sexual abuse and coverup in the People of Praise. All perpetrators and their enablers must finally be held accountable. We must ensure that no child is victimized and silenced by a People of Praise member ever again.”

The FBI did not respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for the PoP did not respond to a request for comment.

The PoP was founded in the 1970s as part of a Christian charismatic movement. The group is led exclusively by men. Like other charismatic communities, it blends Catholicism and Protestant Pentecostalism – its members are mostly Catholic but include some Protestants. In meetings, members are encouraged to share prophecies and speak in tongues. One former member said adherents believe God can speak through members to deliver messages, sometimes about their future.

A PoP handbook states that members are expected to be obedient to male authorities, or group heads, and are expected to give 5% of their earnings to the group. Heads are influential decision-makers in members’ lives, weighing in on issues ranging from dating to marriage, and determining where members should live.

After a waiting period, members agree to a covenant – a lifelong vow – to support each other “financially and materially and spiritually”.

The group has been criticized for endorsing discriminatory practices. Members who engage in gay sex are expelled, and private schools closely affiliated with the group – the Trinity Schools – have admission policies that in effect ban the children of gay parents from attending.

Single members are encouraged to live with other members of the community, including families with children, a practice that former members and adults who grew up in the sect say created opportunities for sexual abuse.

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