Targeted and Entrapped: Manufacturing the 'Homegrown Threat' in the United States

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May 18, 2011 United States
Targeted and Entrapped: Manufacturing the "Homegrown Threat" in the United States

Targeted and Entrapped: Manufacturing the "Homegrown Threat" in the United States

By : Jadaliyya Reports

[The following report was issued by The Center for Human Rights and Global Justice (CHRGJ) at New York University School of Law.]

Targeted and Entrapped: Manufacturing the "Homegrown Threat" in the United States

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Since September 11, 2001, the U.S. government has targeted Muslims in the United States by sending paid, untrained informants into mosques and Muslim communities. This practice has led to the prosecution of more than 200 individuals in terrorism-related cases. The government has touted these cases as successes in the so-called war against terrorism. However, in recent years, former Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents, local lawmakers, the media, the public, and community-based groups have begun questioning the legitimacy and efficacy of this practice, alleging that—in many instances—this type of policing, and the resulting prosecutions, constitute entrapment.

This Report examines three high-profile terrorism prosecutions in which government informants played a critical role in instigating and constructing the plots that were then prosecuted. In all three cases, the FBI or New York City Police Department (NYPD) sent paid informants into Muslim communities or families without any particularized suspicion of criminal activity. Informants pose a particular set of problems given they work on behalf of law enforcement but are not trained as law enforcement. Moreover, they often work for a government-conferred benefit—say, a reduction in a preexisting criminal sentence or a change in immigration status—in addition to fees for providing useful information to law enforcement, creating a dangerous incentive structure.

In the cases this Report examines, the government’s informants held themselves out as Muslims and looked in particular to incite other Muslims to commit acts of violence. The government’s informants introduced and aggressively pushed ideas about violent jihad and, moreover, actually encouraged the defendants to believe it was their duty to take action against the United States. In two of the three cases, the government relied on the defendants’ vulnerabilities—poverty and youth, for example—in its inducement methods. In all three cases, the government selected or encouraged the proposed locations that the defendants would later be accused of targeting. In all three cases, the government also provided the defendants with, or encouraged the defendants to acquire, material evidence, such as weaponry or violent videos, which would later be used to convict them.

The government played a significant role in instigating and devising the three plots featured in this Report—plots the government then “foiled” and charged the defendants with. The defendants in these cases were all convicted and are facing prison sentences of 25 years to life. These prosecutions—and others that similarly rely on the abusive use of informants—are central to the government’s claim that the country faces a “homegrown threat” of terrorism. Serious questions have been raised about the government’s role in each of these cases, as well as around the set of laws that have facilitated these practices. They also raise fundamental human rights concerns.

Part I.A. of this Report considers four trends that have enabled the aggressive and widespread use of informants in Muslim communities: (1) the conflation of Muslims with terrorism and terrorists; (2) the U.S. government’s adoption of unsupported theories about “radicalization” and “homegrown terrorism” in American Muslim11 communities; (3) a shift toward a preventative model of policing and prosecuting terrorism, which seeks to intervene prior to any plan to commit a particular crime; and (4) the lack of accountability and transparency of law enforcement activities. Part I.B. assesses the domestic legal framework governing the use of informants in undercover investigations, including the entrapment defense. Drawing on media accounts, court documents, and interviews, Part II then examines three high-profile terrorism prosecutions, looking closely at the government’s practices in instigating and constructing the plot through informants, and the impacts the prosecutions have had on the families of the defendants. Part III evaluates the human rights impacts of the practices and policies detailed herein and the corresponding obligations of the U.S. government to respect, protect, and fulfill these human rights. Part Iv concludes with policy recommendations.

This Report is grounded in consideration of the government’s prosecutions against the “Newburgh Four” with a focus on defendant David Williams; the “Fort Dix Five” with a focus on defendants Eljvir, Dritan, and Shain Duka; and the case of Shahawar Matin Siraj. Family members of David, Eljvir, Dritan, Shain, and Shahawar were interviewed for this Report, which builds on the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice’s (CHRGJ) longstanding work documenting the impact of U.S. counterterrorism policies on Muslim, Arab, Middle Eastern, and South Asian communities. We also interviewed and consulted with experts, journalists, and community leaders studying these issues,
and drew on court documents and media accounts.

The experiences of the families who were interviewed for this Report demonstrate the profound toll government policies are taking on Muslim communities and families. Counterterrorism law-enforcement policies and practices are undermining U.S. human rights obligations to guarantee the rights to nondiscrimination; a fair trial; freedom of religion expression and opinion; as well as the right to an effective remedy when rights violations take place.

The families have been outspoken about the injustice of these tactics and the prosecutions that they have spawned. A growing chorus of commentators, community members, scholars, and policy experts, is beginning to challenge the legitimacy of the government’s practices, and the notions that these prosecutions substantiate a “homegrown threat” or provide any security- enhancing benefits.

The cases highlighted in this Report do not stand alone. A number of cases around the country have been met with similar concerns, which further suggests that the practices highlighted here are illustrative of similar law enforcement activities targeting Muslim communities around the country. As this Report argues, the U.S. government must put an end to criminalizing Muslim communities. Not only do these practices fail to enhance public safety goals, but they pose intolerable threats to basic human rights across the country.

To abide by these international human rights obligations, CHRGJ urges the U.S. government to act immediately to implement the following recommendations with respect to law enforcement and counterterrorism investigations, particularly those that involve the use of extensive surveillance and paid informants without particularized suspicion of criminal activity:

■ The U.S. government should reject “radicalization” theories that threaten the rights to freedom of religion, opinion, and expression, and should put an end to the preventative policing and prosecution methods that rely on such theories.

■ Congress should hold hearings on the impact of counterterrorism policies on Muslim, Arab, South Asian, and Middle Eastern communities in the United States. These hearings should include consideration of current intelligence-gathering tactics and the use of informants in counterterrorism investigations.

■ Congress should pass the End Racial Profiling Act, proposed federal legislation to ban racial profiling by law enforcement.an end to criminalizing Muslim communities. Not only do these practices fail to enhance public safety goals, but they pose intolerable threats to basic human rights across the
country.

■ The Department of Justice (DOJ) should revise its own June 2003 Federal Guidance on Racial Profiling to eliminate the border and national security loophole, to include a ban on profiling based on religion and ethnic origin, and to ensure that the guidance is enforceable.

■ The DOJ should open an investigation into all terrorism-related cases involving the use of an informant since September 11, 2001, with a view towards examining oversight and actions of informants, the circumstances under which they are deployed, the types of information they gather, and their role in instigating terrorist plots.

■ Attorney General Holder should issue new guidelines to replace the Mukasey Guidelines for Domestic FBI Operations (2008), the 2006 Gonzales Guidelines on Confidential Human Sources, and the 2002 Ashcroft Guidelines on FBI Undercover Operations. These new guidelines should eliminate authorization for the pre-investigation “assessment” stage. Further, the new guidelines should ensure that:

□ The FBI and other law enforcement agencies do not open investigations, including by using informants, against individuals absent particularized
suspicion of wrongdoing.

□ The FBI and other law enforcement agencies are not allowed to target individuals and communities through surveillance, informants, or other information-gathering techniques based on race, religion, or national origin, or political and religious statements or beliefs.

□ The FBI is explicitly and consistently prohibited from using informants to engage in entrapment or inducement to commit crimes.

■ The NYPD should revise its guidelines to only allow for investigations when there is an articulable and reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.

[Click here to download the full report as a PDF document.]
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Jadaliyya Reports By :
Jadaliyya Reports

Past is Present: Settler Colonialism Matters!

On 5-6 March 2011, the Palestine Society at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London will hold its seventh annual conference, "Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine." This year`s conference aims to understand Zionism as a settler colonial project which has, for more than a century, subjected Palestine and Palestinians to a structural and violent form of destruction, dispossession, land appropriation and erasure in the pursuit of a new Jewish Israeli society. By organizing this conference, we hope to reclaim and revive the settler colonial paradigm and to outline its potential to inform and guide political strategy and mobilization.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often described as unique and exceptional with little resemblance to other historical or ongoing colonial conflicts. Yet, for Zionism, like other settler colonial projects such as the British colonization of Ireland or European settlement of North America, South Africa or Australia, the imperative is to control the land and its resources -- and to displace the original inhabitants. Indeed, as conference keynote speaker Patrick Wolfe, one of the foremost scholars on settler colonialism and professor at La Trobe University in Victoria, Australia, argues, "the logic of this project, a sustained institutional tendency to eliminate the Indigenous population, informs a range of historical practices that might otherwise appear distinct--invasion is a structure not an event."[i]

Therefore, the classification of the Zionist movement as a settler colonial project, and the Israeli state as its manifestation, is not merely intended as a statement on the historical origins of Israel, nor as a rhetorical or polemical device. Rather, the aim is to highlight Zionism`s structural continuities and the ideology which informs Israeli policies and practices in Palestine and toward Palestinians everywhere. Thus, the Nakba -- whether viewed as a spontaneous, violent episode in war, or the implementation of a preconceived master plan -- should be understood as both the precondition for the creation of Israel and the logical outcome of Zionist settlement in Palestine.

Moreover, it is this same logic that sustains the continuation of the Nakba today. As remarked by Benny Morris, “had he [David Ben Gurion] carried out full expulsion--rather than partial--he would have stabilised the State of Israel for generations.”[ii] Yet, plagued by an “instability”--defined by the very existence of the Palestinian nation--Israel continues its daily state practices in its quest to fulfill Zionism’s logic to maximize the amount of land under its control with the minimum number of Palestinians on it. These practices take a painful array of manifestations: aerial and maritime bombardment, massacre and invasion, house demolitions, land theft, identity card confiscation, racist laws and loyalty tests, the wall, the siege on Gaza, cultural appropriation, and the dependence on willing (or unwilling) native collaboration and security arrangements, all with the continued support and backing of imperial power. 

Despite these enduring practices however, the settler colonial paradigm has largely fallen into disuse. As a paradigm, it once served as a primary ideological and political framework for all Palestinian political factions and trends, and informed the intellectual work of committed academics and revolutionary scholars, both Palestinians and Jews.

The conference thus asks where and why the settler colonial paradigm was lost, both in scholarship on Palestine and in politics; how do current analyses and theoretical trends that have arisen in its place address present and historical realities? While acknowledging the creativity of these new interpretations, we must nonetheless ask: when exactly did Palestinian natives find themselves in a "post-colonial" condition? When did the ongoing struggle over land become a "post-conflict" situation? When did Israel become a "post-Zionist" society? And when did the fortification of Palestinian ghettos and reservations become "state-building"?

In outlining settler colonialism as a central paradigm from which to understand Palestine, this conference re-invigorates it as a tool by which to analyze the present situation. In doing so, it contests solutions which accommodate Zionism, and more significantly, builds settler colonialism as a political analysis that can embolden and inform a strategy of active, mutual, and principled Palestinian alignment with the Arab struggle for self-determination, and indigenous struggles in the US, Latin America, Oceania, and elsewhere.

Such an alignment would expand the tools available to Palestinians and their solidarity movement, and reconnect the struggle to its own history of anti-colonial internationalism. At its core, this internationalism asserts that the Palestinian struggle against Zionist settler colonialism can only be won when it is embedded within, and empowered by, the broader Arab movement for emancipation and the indigenous, anti-racist and anti-colonial movement--from Arizona to Auckland.

SOAS Palestine Society invites everyone to join us at what promises to be a significant intervention in Palestine activism and scholarship.

For over 30 years, SOAS Palestine Society has heightened awareness and understanding of the Palestinian people, their rights, culture, and struggle for self-determination, amongst students, faculty, staff, and the broader public. SOAS Palestine society aims to continuously push the frontiers of discourse in an effort to make provocative arguments and to stimulate debate and organizing for justice in Palestine through relevant conferences, and events ranging from the intellectual and political impact of Edward Said`s life and work (2004), international law and the Palestine question (2005), the economy of Palestine and its occupation (2006), the one state (2007), 60 Years of Nakba, 60 Years of Resistance (2009), and most recently, the Left in Palestine (2010).

For more information on the SOAS Palestine Society 7th annual conference, Past is Present: Settler Colonialism in Palestine: www.soaspalsoc.org

SOAS Palestine Society Organizing Collective is a group of committed students that has undertaken to organize annual academic conferences on Palestine since 2003.

 

[i] Patrick Wolfe, Settler Colonialism and the Transformation of Anthropology: The Politics and Poetics of an Ethnographic Event, Cassell, London, p. 163

[ii] Interview with Benny Morris, Survival of the Fittest, Haaretz, 9. January 2004, http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/art.php?aid=5412