SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Fiona Tang writes in ACLU FOIA Seeks Information About How Government Launders Evidence:
Today the ACLU [American Civil Liberties Union] filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request seeking records related to "parallel construction," the government's practice of falsifying a trail of evidence in order to conceal controversial investigative techniques from the courts and the public.
Under parallel construction, instead of disclosing how its investigation actually took place, the government presents a sanitized version of events. The practice allows the government to evade legal challenges to the use of such techniques, and also to keep the very existence of such techniques a secret. Recent news reports have shown that parallel construction might be far more common than we'd like to think, so we've asked the government to provide any records it has documenting the practice.
... parallel construction has been used to cover up some of the most notorious surveillance techniques in the past decade. It initially captured the public's attention in August 2013, when Reuters published an article scrutinizing the elusive Drug Enforcement Administration Special Operations Division's use of the practice. Parallel construction received renewed attention this past May, when a non-disclosure agreement between the FBI and the Oklahoma City Police Department was released through a state records request. The non-disclosure agreement governs the use of cell site simulators—colloquially known as "stingrays"—and requires that the Oklahoma City Police Department use the technology for "lead purposes only," further explaining that the agency must "use additional and independent investigative means and methods . . . that would be admissible at trial" in lieu of disclosing to the defendant the fact that a stingray device was used.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by DannyB on Tuesday July 19 2016, @09:38PM
We need to stop using their euphemism.
Parallel Construction is flat out perjury. LYING to the court. Willfully and deliberately. And for the express purpose of hiding illegal activity on the part of the government.
Whatever happened to candor before the tribunal?
Let's not use their spin. Call it what it is. Perjury construction. Lying to the court. Conspiracy by government agents to conceal their crimes.
What Parallel Construction is like that most people can understand.
Let's break in to your house when you're not there, snoop around and find evidence of a crime.
Once we know what the crime is, then we'll otherwise find a more plausible way to have learned about the crime, which further enables us to investigate this crime and prosecute you for it.
And while we're at it, we should search your car while you're not looking.
If you eat an entire cake without cutting it, you technically only had one piece.