From the Associated Press today:
LOS ANGELES – A high-ranking California law enforcement official said in a personnel complaint that he was demoted after questioning the legality of federal and state intelligence-gathering methods, but authorities dispute the claims.
Edward Manavian was chief of criminal intelligence for the California Department of Justice, and chairman of the executive board of the Joint Regional Information Exchange System (a national intelligence network). He says he was ousted in February because he wouldn’t cooperate with state and federal homeland security officials on their invasive intelligence sharing programs.
Here’s the real interesting part:
Manavian also cites his decision to pull out of an FBI operation to infiltrate the Earth Liberation Front and Animal Liberation Front, two underground environmental groups, by planting a state DOJ agent in their meetings on a university campus.
That’s very sloppy reporting — DOJ could not plant an agent in ELF meetings, because the ELF has no formal meetings or membership, by DOJ admission (that would be about as smart as bank robbers holding a town hall forum on their upcoming heist). Given that, let’s read between the lines. This “ELF meeting” had to be a campus activist meeting.
It’s not often that you see cops on the right side of the Green Scare, and opposing harassment and surveillance of law-abiding activists in the name of fighting “eco-terrorism.” Kudos to Manavian, and let’s hope he exposed a bit more about how these witch hunts.