Informants are often utilized to gain information and create a larger case against bigger fish, but is it worth letting them commit 5,658 crimes in a single year?
The FBI gave its informants permission to break the law over 5,000 times in just a single year, according to newly disclosed documents. The staggering number reveals just how much the nation’s top law enforcement agency uses criminals to help battle larger more intense crimes.
The U.S. Justice Department order the FBI to begin tracking the crimes committed by informants roughly a decade ago, after the agency admitted it had allowed Boston mobster “Whitey” Bulger operate a brutal crime ring in exchange for top mafia bosses.
The tally is submitted to Justice Department officials each year, but it’s the first year the numbers have been made public.
On average, agents authorized 15 crimes per day from buying and selling illegal substances to bribing government officials. FBI officials said in the past permitting informants to break the law is an indispensable, if not distasteful, part of investigating large criminal organizations. Shawn Henry, who supervised criminal investigations for the FBI until last year, stated:
“It sounds like a lot, but you have to keep it in context. This is not done in a vacuum. It’s not done randomly. It’s not taken lightly.”
USA Today managed to obtain of a copy of the FBI’s 2011 report utilizing the Freedom of Information Act. The report doesn’t go into details about the exact nature of the crimes authorized, nor does it include crimes committed without the knowledge of the agency.
Denise Ballew, a spokeswoman for the FBI, declined to answer questions regarding the report, saying that the circumstances in which informants are allowed to break the law are ”situational, tightly controlled,” and subject to Justice Department policy. The agency said in a 2007 budget request that it has a network of about 15,000 confidential sources.
