Behind the affidavits, some informants are fiction
Article Abstract:
Few attorneys and judges question law enforcement information based on unnamed informants because the informants' confidentiality is protected. However, an investigation into the use of informants found that they are often fabricated to allow officers obtain warrants based on hunches. One example of this abuse of informants involved a drug search that resulted in an officer's death and the informant could not be produced. Officers originally claimed the informant was dead and yet affidavits from the informant were dated after the supposed death.
Publication Name: The National Law Journal
Subject: Law
ISSN: 0162-7325
Year: 1995
User Contributions:
Comment about this article or add new information about this topic:
Informer's lies trigger a tragedy: a DEA probe into a bungled raid points to broken rules and bad communication
Article Abstract:
The Drug Enforcement Agency's reliance on an informer who was a convicted felon and known to be unreliable resulted in the shooting by DEA officers of an innocent businessman in his San Diego home. Though many of the agents on the case were convinced their informant was lying, a warrant was granted and a midnight raid took place in which Donald Carson was shot three times, twice in the back, by DEA agents. The DEA says that they should have handled the situation differently. Carson received a $2.5 million settlement.
Publication Name: The National Law Journal
Subject: Law
ISSN: 0162-7325
Year: 1995
User Contributions:
Comment about this article or add new information about this topic:
- Abstracts: Informant reforms: focussing on oversight. Did informer and sheriff plot a political revenge? Secret threat to justice: there are few controls over the hidden alliance of agents and informers
- Abstracts: He says, she thinks. Not snow, nor sleet, nor gadget boom will kill the billable hour. All value isn't billable