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A comment on I refused to become an FBI informant, the government put me on the no fly list. Parent comment

Re:I refused to become an FBI informant, the government put ... by gumby on Tuesday April 06, 2021 @03:42PM (#26716462)
The comparison is certainly valid. Almost all the FBI's "terrorism" convictions over the last 20 years have been people set ip by a CI or agent, including the FBI supplying materiel.

The fact that there still exists, to some degree, a mechanism in the USA to challenge this in some cases is indeed something to celebrate, but the quite reasonable comparison is not just legitimate and appropriate but is a tool for trying to fix the injustice, not just retail (one victim at a time) but wholesale (change of law).

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Re:I refused to become an FBI informant, the government put ... by vkou on Tuesday April 06, 2021 @03:50PM (#26716562)
> The comparison is certainly valid. Almost all the FBI's "terrorism" convictions over the last 20 years have been people set ip by a CI or agent, including the FBI supplying materiel.

There's a quantitive difference between an FBI agent inviting an idiot to coffee, and fabricating a plot with him to blow up a post office, and an FBI agent getting in touch with an idiot who is plotting to blow up a post office, and offering to give him fake explosives.

The former might be entrapment. The latter is good policework.

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Re:I refused to become an FBI informant, the government put ... by sonthonax on Tuesday April 06, 2021 @04:48PM (#26717204)
Much of the anti domestic terrorism work which the FBI did was entrapment. The FBI plants were frequently under pressure to show proof that their assigned organisations were in fact terrorist cells.

http://jfk.hood.edu/Collection/Weisberg%20Subject%20Index%20...

The police would plant people in suspect groups who pressure the rest of the group to engage in terrorist activity.

This isn’t exclusive to 1970s USA. Similar things happened in mosques after 9/11 where Imans would know an FBI agent simply because he was the only extremist in the congregation.

And in the United Kingdom, there were long term plants in environmental organisations who engaged in ecoterrorism.

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Re:I refused to become an FBI informant, the government put ... by throwfaraway52 on Tuesday April 06, 2021 @04:54PM (#26717272)
I've read several stories over the years and seen at least one documentary where it's pretty clear they were doing the former. It's generally chalked up as a win, gets good press / pr - keeps the funds going in that direction, and keeps the average headline reader scared enough to be fine with pariot acts and similar things going.

I do not recall any stories of the latter.. perhaps there is one or some - and perhaps things have occurred that saved the X Y or Z and we'll never know - and that's great.

However I think it's high time that people paid more attention to the details of these "be afraid / keep sending us budgets" stories and see that many are fabricated just to check off a PR box.

9 out of 10 sex trafficking headline stories are the same, and similar.

It's not just the top level of the DOJ - the local law agencies use the same playbook (especially vice squads) for the same reasons. imho.

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Re:I refused to become an FBI informant, the government put ... by gumby on Tuesday April 06, 2021 @08:36PM (#26719154)
They did also get involved with some bad people and rounded them up too, don't worry. But a lot of their work seems to have been ruining lives in order to look productive. Tragic!
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Re:I refused to become an FBI informant, the government put ... by rhizome on Tuesday April 06, 2021 @04:11PM (#26716787)
But they both result in similar convictions, so it's just another day in the salt mines regardless.
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