It's funny... if an engineer fucks something up, s/he can be personally responsible for the fuckup.... doctors need personal malpractice insurance for their fuckups... professional drivers can easily go to jail if they fuck up...<p>...but if a government worker, paid by the taxpayers, fucks up... the worst that can happen is, the taxpayers have to pay for eventual lawsuit cost and damages to the people who got fucked by that worker.<p>For something like this, atleast a few people should end up in jail for a long time.
In the Crossfire Hurricane case, an FBI Lawyer - Kevin Clinesmith doctored an email from the CIA and used the doctored email as fake evidence to secure a FISA warrant. He doctored the email to mean the exact opposite of what the email was communicating. It seems to have been uncritically assumed that this lawyer acted alone and nobody else at the agency was aware of this act. Stories like this seem to suggest that this manner of operation could be fairly routine at the agency.
Here's the lesson I want people to take away from this: the idea that there is a literal interpretation of the Constitution is a myth.<p>This egregious seizure is just further proof that the Fourth Amendment is pretty much dead. Any kind of forfeiture without probable cause should be a Fourth Amendment violation but yet civil asset forfeiture (the most egregious form of Fourth Amendment violation) remains legal.<p>Probably the worst thing about this case is that the government has been caught in a lie and isn't backing down and they want to keep the contents. Any "evidence" gleaned from these contents should be absolutely inadmissible without prior and specific probable cause. There should be no allowance for "there's no reason why legitimate customers would use USPV instead of a bank".<p>Lots of people distrust banks. Not using a bank is not evidence of a crime let alone probable cause.<p>I really hope the FBI and the US attorney get their rear ends handed to them over this but I have doubts they ever will.
In my lifetime one of the biggest freedoms we have lost is private banking. Prior to 9/11 banking was relatively private. What you had was your own, and secret. You could even have a private bank account in Switzerland. Now, if you are American foreign banks won't even bother dealing with you.<p>Obviously the paranoid state, won't like the idea of a private safety deposit box company.<p>I think the next leg to fall is cash itself. We will move to CBDC and social credit.
“Based on my training and experience” is the magic phrase that lets feds say whatever falsehoods they want in a warrant application (a sworn statement made under penalty of perjury) and suffer zero consequences for lying.<p>Literally 100% of the times I have read this phrase, obvious falsehoods followed shortly thereafter.<p>Courts and police conspire to avoid penalizing police with violations of law.
Submitting false statements to the court should be an offense that carries jail time - and it should be even harsher for agents of the government and law enforcement officers.
Semi related: It is interesting that these items are not considered the bank's property yet if I upload something to the cloud it is considered the cloud provider's data.<p>Why isn't cloud data treated the same as a safety deposit box?
> Only those who wish to hide their wealth from the DEA, IRS, or creditors would” rent a box anonymously at U.S. Private Vaults, she wrote<p>It appears this opinion was wrong: many honest people did choose this store instead of a bank for their safety deposit needs. I wonder why? I understand this question has no bearing on the legality of the FBI actions, but I do want to understand the customers' rationale.
Don't forget the bit where the FBI claimed that a lot of the seized money was physically contaminated with illegal drug residue, but we can't show you the evidence because we converted all the physical seized cash into vouchers/deposits. But please trust us and we'd like to indict people on this evidence.
From a few months ago, the same raid: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32267266" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32267266</a>