Comments on: Momma Said There’d Be Days Like This

By: Matt Weiner

Matt Weiner — Thu, 27 May 2004 03:51:33 +0000

Well, I don’t think the FBI earns any brownie points by failing to examine the goddamn evidence. I mean, the message I got from the 9/11 hearings was not “Make more shit up, please.” I recommend that there are two imperatives that potentially conflict but I think it’s pretty easy to see that they don’t conflict in this case—locking up people whose innocence you can easily check doesn’t make us any safer.

By: Tom T.

Tom T. — Thu, 27 May 2004 00:33:51 +0000

Indeed not, and that’s precisely my point. Current incentives toward “overly aggressive dot-connecting” push the FBI away from “excessive caution and concern over screwing up.”

By: Matt Weiner

Matt Weiner — Wed, 26 May 2004 18:45:19 +0000

This morning I read (above the fold in a newspaper vending-box) that the FBI was so confident about Mayfield that they never looked at the original fingerprint. Does that strike you as behavior induced by excessive caution and concern over screwing up?

By: Tom T.

Tom T. — Wed, 26 May 2004 03:03:53 +0000

You denounce the FBI for the apparent assumption that if Hawash is guilty, then Mayfield must be too, but then you suggest that since Mayfield is apparently innocent, then Hawash must be too. Also, bear in mind that the FBI has very recently been beaten over the head by the 9/11 commission (and various people who tend toward “hatin’ on the government”) for having failed to connect various dots prior to that date. Presumably one effect of that criticism has been to suggest to the FBI that it is currently better to err a bit on the side of overly aggressive dot-connecting.

By: Giles

Giles — Tue, 25 May 2004 20:04:21 +0000

It would seem that Oregen and fingerprints dont work too well together: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/05/11/identix_false_id_suit/ At San Jose Superior Court today (11 May) biometrics company Identix will seek to have a product liability and slander lawsuit against it and the States of California and Oregon dismissed. Plaintiffs Roger Benson and Miguel Espinoza are seeking restitution for the damage inflicted on them by duplication in police records which gave them other people’s criminal records. Benson was wrongfully imprisoned for 43 days for carrying a firearm when a convicted felon, although the felony on his record had been committed by someone else, while Espinoza, had his restaurant business destroyed by a false record of a criminally negligent homicide conviction. The plaintiffs claim that their problems stemmed from Identix’s Livescan 10-print, a fingerprint scanner used to enter fingerprint data into police systems. Two months ago Identix was re-confirmed as the winner of a Department of Homeland Security Blanket Purchase Agreement (BPA) for fingeprint systems, this being worth and estimated $27 million over five years. Identix is also supplying equipment for the UK Passport Service’s ID card pilot, so one might reasonably consider that the stakes in San Jose Superior Court will be rather high.

By: notanumber

notanumber — Tue, 25 May 2004 15:35:24 +0000

I wonder who the “independent expert” is, and how “independent” she/he really is?

By: Your Devoted Mom

Your Devoted Mom — Tue, 25 May 2004 15:32:45 +0000

If Allah comes down to my house this afternoon in all splendiferous godhood, I would still have to say “No Way. Talk to the hand, Allah. This is the US of A and I’m not converting”. My favorite part of the story about the bust on Mayfield’s house was the confiscation of his children’s Spanish homework,[AHA WE CAUGHT HIM] as evidence of a connection to Spain. I hear the kids are getting their workbooks back and hopefully their teachers won’t fail them for not turning in their notebooks on time. I miss you guys. Your most devoted fan, yr Mom

By: Barry

Barry — Tue, 25 May 2004 15:03:02 +0000

And the two-stage process leads to a question: it’s reasonable that the initial set of [potential] matches were done automatically. However, once a short list was generated, a re-check should have been done.

By: daithi mac mhaolmhuaidh

daithi mac mhaolmhuaidh — Tue, 25 May 2004 13:31:07 +0000

The most charitable explanation is that the FBI ran the prints against a special secret list of suspicious Muslims, and Mayfield’s was the closest match. But is that so great? No it most certainly is not. And well done your skeptical mother.

By: arthegall

arthegall — Tue, 25 May 2004 11:56:51 +0000

Not to get all Ockham’s razorish on you I guess it depends on what the value of your prior is. And, not to defend the FBI here (which pretty obviously made a gross mistake), but “surveillance” != “investigation,” right?

By: Greg Hunter

Greg Hunter — Tue, 25 May 2004 11:29:36 +0000

Mayfield appears to be a set up, but so is every part of the Patriot Act. The Act was sold as strictly a terror-fighting tool. However, it appears to be a criminal enforcement tool and it is being sold to the American Public, and indirectly the world (in the Mayfield Case), through John Ashcroft’s targeting of Child Pornographers and Drug Runners. If one equates this process with the break down at Abu Ghraib, the future for American/World citizens under the Patriot Act does not look good.

By: Giles

Giles — Tue, 25 May 2004 07:08:40 +0000

No, he was selected off the list because he was a “Muslim already under FBI surveillance,” as opposed to a the 70 year old granny in Fairbanks or whoever else was on the list. And since you dont know what the list was, you’re rather jumping to conclusions speculating that he was infact the most innocent sounding person on the list. Think about it, tt’d be a strange police service that investigated the least likely suspects first.

By: Belle Waring

Belle Waring — Tue, 25 May 2004 05:42:23 +0000

No, I don’t think so. The fact that there were two stages, first the large database and then the short list, doesn’t detract from the overall unlikeliness that a misidentified print would—just by chnce—belong to a Muslim already under FBI surveillance, rather than one of the hundreds of millions of Americans who are not. The FBI says that he was picked off the short list based on careful fingerprint analysis, not external factors. I don’t buy it.

By: Giles

Giles — Tue, 25 May 2004 05:32:33 +0000

“The result of an IAFIS search produces a short list of potential matches.” cf “seriously, does anyone believe that the FBI innocently ran this through a general database and just happened to mistakenly come up with a Muslim advocate for one of the “Portland Seven”?” The FBI says it came up with a list – not just one persone – but a list out of which the most likely suspect was selected. So your whole premis is false

By: P O'Neill

P O'Neill — Tue, 25 May 2004 04:02:57 +0000

And how about this whole crock of the “material witness” warrant? The Administration loves to talk about the US respecting the principle of innocent till proven guilty (except for terrorists) and even people who know better will claim that evil countries like France have preventive detention where innocent people can be locked up while only under investigation…except…that’s exactly what a material witness warrant does. Lock up first, ask questions later. Another end-run around the constitution.