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    City Settles on $2.6m Payout for Death of Confidential Informant

    Monday, January 9th, 2012

    The city of Tallahassee, Florida, has approved a $2.6m settlement after the parents of Rachel Hoffman sued the city for negligence leading to the death of their 23-year-old daughter in 2008. Hoffman had been arrested for minor drugs offences and agreed to act as a confidential informant for police in order to get leniency in her sentencing. Unfortunately, the drugs sting went disastrously wrong, ending up with Hoffman being shot dead by the drug dealers that the police were trying to incriminate.

    Since these unfortunate events, the state of Florida has introduced “Rachel’s Law”, requiring law enforcement agencies to provide specialist training for confidential informant handlers and implement better safeguards.

    Some law enforcement agencies have taken the example of Tallahassee very seriously, implementing robust management processes to reduce the risk associated with confidential informants. However, other agencies still need to take a more proactive approach towards ensuring that informants are used more carefully and intelligently. Rachel’s Law is a good step forward in improving US practices regarding informants, but there is still more progress to be made. Let’s hope that other states take some of these lessons on board and that every effort is made to enhance the requirements under Rachel’s Law to ensure that opportunities for risky practices are further removed.

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    Drugs Sting Goes Badly Wrong in Texas

    Tuesday, November 29th, 2011

    A confidential informant is murdered, the truck he was driving is buried in a wall, a Sheriff’s Deputy is shot by another police officer and four people are injured in a collision with a school bus.

    This sounds like the plot of a car chase in a blockbuster movie. Unfortunately it was all the result of an undercover narcotics operation that went badly wrong in Texas last week.

    As reported by KHOU, undercover officers from Harris County Sheriff’s Office (HCSO), Houston Police Department (HPD) and members of the Drugs Task Force were following a truck being driven by a confidential informant. The truck was loaded with at least 300lb of marijuana and the law enforcement officers were following it in order to arrest the drug dealers who would receive the delivery. However, whilst en route several other vehicles suddenly appeared, showering the truck with bullets and killing the confidential informant. A gun battle that followed, with officers firing back at the hijackers killing one of them, while another one was hit twice by a patrol vehicle. In the confusion a plain clothes HCSO deputy was allegedly shot in the leg by a HPD officer who didn’t recognise him. A patrol vehicle responding to the scene added to the chaos by colliding with a school bus, injuring the two drivers and two other people.

    It is not clear whether the hijackers were intending to steal the drugs shipment or just assassinate the confidential informant. What is clear, however, is that the law enforcement operation certainly did not go to plan, despite law enforcement succeeding in arresting four men accused of storming the truck.

    The whole case raises issues over confidential informant anonymity and protection, risk management and deconfliction. When dealing with narcotics and unpredictable drug dealers, mistakes can happen. I just hope that law enforcement went through proper procedures to assess the risk associated with this particular operation before they embarked upon it.

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    Georgia Terror Case Reveals Importance of Informant Reliability

    Monday, November 21st, 2011

    The importance of ensuring informant reliability is currently being demonstrated in federal court as four men are accused of plotting to attack US government officials.

    As reported by 11 Alive, the court heard recordings of the men discussing their targets. However, defense lawyers are arguing that the recording have been taken out of context and that they were recorded by an unreliable confidential informant with “a series of legal troubles, including two recent charges of child pornography and child molestation”.

    In such cases, corroboration of evidence is crucial – given the seriousness of the charges and the allegations against the informant, one has to hope that the prosecution has some good corroborative evidence up their sleeves.

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    Will H.R. 3228 improve confidential informant management?

    Thursday, October 20th, 2011

    Congressman Stephen F. Lynch has introduced a bill (the Confidential Informant Accountability Act of 2011 – H.R. 3228) to improve the way that confidential informants are managed by US federal law enforcement agencies. Lynch introduced the bill in response to the James “Whitey” Bulger case in which Bulger, a notorious gang leader acting as a confidential informant for the FBI, is alleged to have gunned down two men.

    The legislation would impose a number of safeguards for confidential informant management as well as making it easier for the victims of rogue confidential informants to sue the government for negligence.

    The bill would require law enforcement agencies to report any serious crimes committed by confidential informants to Congress every six months. Certain details would have to be included but informant names and identifying information would be excluded to protect anonymity.

    The ultimate aim is to improve oversight of confidential informant programme and ensure that the system is not abused by law enforcement officials.

    In order to achieve a truly fair and safe system, law enforcement agencies need to think carefully about how their policies and procedures work to assess and mitigate the risks associated with confidential informants. Failure to properly assess a confidential informant for reliability and trustworthiness can have potentially catastrophic consequences. Whilst regular reporting of confidential informants’ illegal activity to Congress may help to prevent some malpractice, it does not necessarily eliminate the potential for other things to go wrong in the system. Confidential informant management software can be a useful tool in helping to achieve this, but if the management of confidential informants is really to improve it is important that internal cultures are addressed as well.

     

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    Confidential Informants – understand what you’re agreeing to!

    Monday, September 26th, 2011

    A confidential informant in Wyoming has just lost the appeal against his drug conviction. The informant, Marshal Lewis Washington, had agreed to become a confidential informant for Wyoming Division of Criminal Investigation after he was imprisoned for shoplifting. Unfortunately, Washington took this to mean that he was authorised to buy drugs without law enforcement supervision. Before conducting a controlled drug buy, narcotics officers performed a customary search of Washington’s car where they found “an array of controlled substances”… They promptly arrested him for possession.

    Despite Washington’s appeal that he believed DCI agents had authorised him to buy drugs on his own, the DCI insisted that he has been thoroughly briefed regarding his role. Washington lost his appeal on Tuesday.

    This story, as reported in trib.com, emphasises the importance of properly explaining ground rules and expectation to confidential informants. Failure to do so can, as exemplified here, just facilitate more criminal activity.

     

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    Another officer disciplined in confidential informant mismanagement case

    Monday, August 22nd, 2011

    Vancouver Police sergeant Duane McNicholas is the latest officer to be disciplined following an investigation into the mismanagement of confidential informant, Tegan Rushworth. As reported by The Columbian, Rushworth, an attractive former Fort Vancouver Rodeo Queen turned methamphetamine user, was working for the police department as a confidential informant. Her handler,  Erik McGarrity, engaged in an inappropriate sexual relationship with her. It appears that McGarrity and the other three officers failed to arrest Rushworth despite a warrant being issued for her arrest.

    This case illustrates the need for law enforcement agencies to implement robust authorization and management procedures for the use of confidential informants. Proper risk management and management oversight would probably have prevented this embarrassing incident which, as VPD Cmdr. Dave King noted, put the department in potentially litigious situations and allowed the credibility of the agency to be impacted.

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    New law requires jailhouse witness statement corroboration

    Thursday, August 4th, 2011

    As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, Governor Jerry Brown of California has approved bill SB687 which will require prosecutors to corroborate jailhouse witness testimony in court. The statements of jailhouse witnesses, prisoners that inform against fellow inmates, will no longer be sufficient evidence to find a defendant guilty of a crime. Prosecutors will now have to ensure that additional independent evidence is gathered to support charges against the defendant.

    Whilst some people have argued that this will make it harder to secure criminal convictions, supporters of the new legislation argue that it will help to prevent miscarriages of justice based on jailhouse informants who may have reasons to fabricate statements against fellow inmates. 17 other states have already introduced similar legislation.

    Police forces and prosecutors will now face the challenge of putting processes are in place to make sure that appropriate evidence is gathered following witness statements from jailhouse informants. ABM’s abmpegasus Debrief module is designed to do just that.

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    California Assembly passes confidential informant legislation

    Monday, July 18th, 2011

    The California Assembly has passed bill SB 687 which would prevent criminal conviction based solely on the uncorroborated testimony of a jailhouse informant. The bill recognises the need for informants in the fight against organised crime, yet it also accepts the inherent pitfalls of confidential informants who may have hidden agendas in testifying against other suspected criminals.

    SB 687, which is supported by San Francisco and Los Angeles County’s District Attorneys, aims to reduce the potential for wrongful convictions based on informants’ testimony.

    The bill is now awaiting approval by the governor of California and it will have implications for law enforcement across the state. Law enforcement agencies will have to take more care in the collection and management of intelligence to ensure that evidence against suspected perpetrators of crime is sufficiently strong.

    More at http://sfappeal.com/news/2011/07/jailhouse-informant-bill-passes-assembly.php

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    Is a confidential informant’s testimony worth $400k?

    Monday, July 11th, 2011

    As reported on NewsOn6.com, a key witness in the Tulsa Police corruption case is hoping to get $400,000 from authorities after helping the FBI to build a case against corrupt Tulsa Police officers. There will always be controversy over paying convicted criminals to provide information to law enforcement, but it is surely impossible to put a price on the value to society in rooting out corrupt officials.

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    ACLU criticises use of confidential informants in New Jersey

    Friday, July 1st, 2011

    The American Civil Liberties Union has published a report criticising the way that confidential informants (CIs) are used in the state of New Jersey. The report finds that some law enforcement agencies do not have policies regarding the proper management of CIs, while many of those that do have proper policies have failed to ensure that officers are trained to ensure that policies are adhered to. The report suggests that there are too many opportunities for deliberate or accidental misuse of CIs, leading to potential for injustice to occur.

    Just three months ago, ACLU published a similar report criticising the state of Mississippi’s  drug enforcement system, stating that the incentives for confidential informants need to be more carefully managed.

    Such lack of confidence in the management of CIs should be a cause for great concern among law enforcement agencies. It is important that officers properly asses the risk and reliability of information provided by CIs before acting upon it. If law enforcement agencies want to ensure that this is achieved, it is vital that proper policies and procedures are in place and properly communicated to officers. Managers need to have oversight of all interaction with CIs.

    In the United Kingdom, legislation and best practice has helped to ensure that CIs are managed in a safe and compliant way. Software, such as abmpegasus Source Management, helps to make sure that proper procedures are followed and that the use of CIs is fully assessed for risk and authorised accordingly.

    ACLU’s report, “An Exploratory Study of the Use of Confidential Informants in New Jersey” can be found at http://www.aclu-nj.org/downloads/0611ACLUCIReport.pdf and “Numbers Game: The Vicious Cycle of Incarceration in Mississippi’s Criminal Justice System” can be found at http://www.aclu.org/prisoners-rights/numbers-game-vicious-cycle-incarceration-mississippis-criminal-justice-system

    http://media.nj.com/ledgerupdates_impact/other/report.pdf

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