Anyone who is surprised at recent revelations that the FBI might have destroyed or “lost” evidence that makes the law enforcement agency look bad need only examine recent history to see what a common practice this is.
The agency has a long history of sweeping damning information, “losing” evidence or just suppressing information that would tarnish its image under the rug, The Hill reports.
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The latest scandal involves reports that the FBI accidentally “lost” (or purposely deleted) five months’ worth of text messages between two FBI agents who were not only having an affair, but were actively supporting Hillary Clinton over President Donald Trump.
Lisa Page and Peter Strzok were reassigned after news of their illicit affair and secret anti-Trump discussions made headlines.
But James Bovard, an author and USA Today columnist, writes that concealing damaging information is common practice at the FBI that goes back decades.
Conservatives are caterwauling about the vanished evidence but this type of tactic has long been standard procedure for the FBI. Acting FBI chief Patrick Gray was forced to resign in 1973 after it was revealed that he had burned incriminating evidence from the White House in his fireplace shortly after the Watergate break-in by Nixon White House “plumbers.” Gray claimed he was resigning to preserve the “reputation and integrity” of the FBI — but that hasn’t worked out so well.
The FBI has a long history of “losing” evidence that would tarnish its halo. And for most of the agency’s history, judges and Congress have let the FBI sweep its dirt under the rug.
Bovard points to the Ruby Ridge case in 1992, when an FBI sniper shot a woman holding her baby. Then, the FBI’s Violent Crimes chief went to prison. “When a Senate committee held hearings three years later, four FBI agents took the Fifth Amendment rather than tell the incriminating truth about their activities on the Ruby Ridge case,” he writes.
A subsequent Senate report concluded that the five successive FBI reports of internal investigations of the episode “are variously contradictory, inaccurate, and biased. They demonstrate a reluctance on the part of the FBI initially to take the incidents at Ruby Ridge seriously.” Sen. Herbert Kohl (D-Wis.) complained, “I would be asked by the FBI to believe (Ruby Ridge) was almost a model of (good) conduct. The conclusion, is drawn, from … all the people we’ve heard, that no one did anything wrong of significance or consequence.”
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The chaos at Waco 25 years ago is another example. As many as 100 FBI agents may have known about the explosive devices used by the agency at the Branch Davidian compound, despite Janet Reno’s constant denials that they were used. The FBI withheld videotape of the attack for years rather than let the evidence surface.
This also happened in 2014 with the standoff with Cliven Bundy in Nevada. During the trial, Federal Judge Gloria Navarro slammed the FBI last month for withholding key evidence in the case.
So what will happen this time. You don’t need to toss evidence into a fireplace. You can blame “firmware upgrades” for the destruction of evidence, leaving only conspiracy theorists to ponder. But, as Bovard writes: “the FBI is no closer to being compelled to operate openly than when Patrick Gray ignited those White House files.”
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