F.B.I.'s Reach Into Records Is Set to Grow

Steve Schear s.schear at comcast.net
Tue Nov 11 22:30:55 PST 2003


http://www.nytimes.com/2003/11/12/politics/12RECO.html

November 12, 2003


F.B.I.'s Reach Into Records Is Set to Grow

By ERIC LICHTBLAU

ASHINGTON, Nov. 11 A little-noticed measure approved by both the House and 
Senate would significantly expand the F.B.I.'s power to demand financial 
records, without a judge's approval, from car dealers, travel agents, 
pawnbrokers and many other businesses, officials said on Tuesday.

Traditional financial institutions like banks and credit unions are 
frequently subject to administrative subpoenas from the Federal Bureau of 
Investigation to produce financial records in terrorism and espionage 
investigations. Such subpoenas, which are known as national security 
letters, do not require the bureau to seek a judge's approval before 
issuing them.

The measure now awaiting final approval in Congress would significantly 
broaden the law to include securities dealers, currency exchanges, car 
dealers, travel agencies, post offices, casinos, pawnbrokers and any other 
institution doing cash transactions with "a high degree of usefulness in 
criminal, tax or regulatory matters."

Officials said the measure, which is tucked away in the intelligence 
community's authorization bill for 2004, gives agents greater flexibility 
and speed in seeking to trace the financial assets of people suspected of 
terrorism and espionage. It mirrors a proposal that President Bush outlined 
in a speech two months ago to expand the use of administrative subpoenas in 
terrorism cases.

Critics said the measure would give the federal government greater power to 
pry into people's private lives.

"This dramatically expands the government's authority to get private 
business records," said Timothy H. Edgar, legislative counsel for the 
American Civil Liberties Union. "You buy a ring for your grandmother from a 
pawnbroker, and the record on that will now be considered a financial 
record that the government can get."

The provision is in the authorization bills passed by both houses of 
Congress. Some Democrats have begun to question whether the measure goes 
too far and have hinted that they may try to have it pulled when the bill 
comes before a House-Senate conference committee. Other officials predicted 
that the measure would probably survive any challenges in conference and be 
signed into law by President Bush, in part because the provisions already 
approved in the House and the Senate are identical.

The intelligence committees considered the proposal at the request of 
George J. Tenet, the director of central intelligence, officials said. 
Officials at the C.I.A. and the Justice Department declined to comment on 
Tuesday about the measure.

A senior Congressional official who supports the provision said that "this 
is meant to provide agents with the same amount of flexibility in terrorism 
investigations that they have in other types of investigations."

"This was really just a technical change to reflect the new breed of 
financial institutions," the official added.

Asked what had prompted the measure, the official said: "This is coming 
from 3,000 dead people. There's an ever-expanding universe of places where 
terrorists can hide financial transactions, and it's only prudent and wise 
to anticipate where they might be and to give law enforcement the tools 
that they need to find them."

Christopher Wray, the Justice Department's assistant attorney general in 
charge of the criminal division, also addressed the issue last month at a 
Senate hearing.

Mr. Wray said that compared with the antiterrorism law that allowed agents 
to demand business records with court approval, the F.B.I.'s administrative 
subpoenas were more limited. The administrative subpoenas "do provide for 
production of some records," he said, but "they don't cover as many types 
of business records." 





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