FBI to get new Phoenix headquarters
March 5th, 2010 | Facilities General Services Administration Justice | Posted by Tim Kauffman
FBI employees now scattered in four locations in the Phoenix area will move into a new 200,000-square-foot office building about two years from now.
The General Services Administration announced Wednesday it has selected the Phoenix office of construction firm Ryan Companies to build the $62 million facility. The building will be owned by Ryan and leased to GSA for use by the FBI under a 20-year lease.
Many companies apparently competed for the build-to-suit lease project, indicating the high level of interest in government projects in a time of economic uncertainty in the construction industry.
John Strittmatter, president of Ryan’s southwest division, told the Phoenix Business Journal that the effort was well worth it.
It was a national competition that lasted well over a year. It was a long and expensive process, but we’re very excited.
The building currently is being designed; construction will begin this fall and take 18 months to complete.
Tags: FBI
FBI closes file on anthrax mailings; says Ivins acted alone
February 19th, 2010 | Justice | Posted by Stephen Losey
The FBI today said it has formally closed its investigation into the 2001 anthrax mailings that killed five people — including U.S. Postal Service workers Joseph Curseen and Thomas Morris — and sickened 17 others. The 96-page investigative summary posted here concludes that Army anthrax researcher Bruce Ivins, who committed suicide in 2008, acted alone:
Investigators learned that Dr. Ivins was alone late at night and on the weekend in the lab where RMR-1029 [the batch of anthrax spores used in the attacks] was stored in the days immediately preceding the dates on which the anthrax could have been mailed. Before the anthrax mailings, Dr. Ivins had never exhibited that pattern of working alone in the lab extensively during non-business hours, and he never did so after the anthrax attacks. When confronted, he was unable to give a legitimate explanation for keeping these unusual and, in the context of the investigation, suspicious hours.
[...] Dr. Ivins was among the very few anthrax researchers nationwide with the knowledge and ability to create the highly purified spores used in the mailings. Finally, everyone else who had access to RMR-1029 was ruled out as the mailer because, among other reasons, they lacked the ability and/or opportunity to prepare and store the material.
The report goes into more detail on Ivins’ obsessions and mental health problems and other suspicious activity before and after the anthrax mailings.
More documents detailing the Amerithrax investigation can be found here and here.
Tags: anthrax, bioterrorism, Bruce Ivins, FBI
Student sues government over TSA, FBI actions
February 11th, 2010 | Agencies Justice Transportation Security Administration | Posted by Rebecca Neal
A Pennsylvania college student sued the federal government Wednesday, saying that TSA and FBI officials detained him at an airport because he was carrying a set of English-Arabic flashcards, reports The Washington Post.
Nicholas George, 22, of Montgomery County, Pa., is a senior majoring in physics and Middle Eastern studies at California’s Pomona College. In his lawsuit, he argues that he was detained for five hours in August at the Philadelphia airport because three Transportation Security Administration officers, two Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and two Philadelphia police officers were suspicious of his flashcards and semester studying abroad in the Middle East. George’s lawsuit states that the detainment was a violation of his constitutional rights to free speech and freedom from unreasonable search and seizure.
The Post quotes an anonymous source who said the questioning of George was based on officers’ observations of George’s behavior:
A federal official familiar with the matter, discussing the case on the condition of anonymity, said that TSA officers observed “anomalous” behavior by George before he entered the checkpoint. The official said his “erratic” conduct escalated upon screening and, along with other unspecified factors, that led officers to call police to investigate further.
Under questioning, George said he was not a “terrorist, a communist, a Muslim or a member of any campus ‘pro-Islamic group,’” at which point FBI agents told him he was not a threat and let him go.
Should the FBI building come down?
January 25th, 2010 | Facilities Justice Uncategorized | Posted by Tim Kauffman
Is it time for the FBI headquarters building to go missing?
The folks over at WeLoveDC.com asked readers today to name a building they’d like to see erased from the DC skyline, and the results could spark a federal investigation.
Most readers called for the J. Edgar Hoover FBI Building to be torn down. The headquarters building, built between 1967 and 1974, is made of poured concrete in the Brutalist architectural style that was popular at the time but has since gone out of fashion.
Other readers suggested that what the building really needs is an overhaul, not a demolition, pointing out that restoring outdated buildings is not only environmentally preferable but a big source of revenue to the district.
So what do you think? Are there worse offenders out there than the FBI building, and is the best solution to tear down or fix up these outdated structures?
Tags: building, FBI, preservation
Paul Harvey + J. Edgar Hoover = BFF
January 22nd, 2010 | Agencies Justice | Posted by Rebecca Neal
And now, the rest of the story, courtesy of The Washington Post.
The Post has obtained previously confidential FBI files showing a close friendship between the late broadcaster Paul Harvey and the late former FBI director J. Edgar Hoover. The two exchanged frequent letters throughout the 1950s and 1960s, according to the Post.
The Post says Harvey frequently sent Hoover “advance copies of his radio script for comment and approval. Harvey wrote Hoover and his deputies regularly. Hoover, in turn, helped Harvey with research, suggested changes in scripts and showered the broadcaster with effusive praise.”
The two bondered over a shared hatred of communism, the Post states. Harvey wrote to Sen. Joseph McCarthy in 1956, offering tips on “known Reds” at a Texas Air Force base. McCarthy, of course, conducted the famous hearings on supposed Communists in the federal government and entertainment industry, among other fields. The FBI protected Harvey’s identity, the Post reports.
A senior FBI official added a handwritten notation to ensure that Harvey’s letter not be distributed outside the bureau’s top brass: “No dissemination since identity of Harvey cannot be revealed.”
Tags: FBI
FBI Tweets
April 3rd, 2009 | Information Technology Justice | Posted by Elise Castelli
Earlier this week I wrote about how FDA was using Twitter to tweet about product recalls. But that’s not the only agency that uses Twitter to share information in a crisis.
The FBI tweets too. And is tweeting right now to let folks know that agency hostage negotiators are on their way from Albany to Binghamton, N.Y. to respond to the shooting and ongoing hostage situation there.
Tags: FBI, social media, twitter
Updated: AP reports federal CIO on leave
March 12th, 2009 | Information Technology Justice | Posted by Elise Castelli
Update 2: The Associated Press is reporting that Federal CIO Vivek Kundra is on leave “until further details of the case become known” following the raid of his former office this morning.
While the raid was going on Kundra spoke at an IT conference today. He set out bold plans for reforming federal IT by opening up more information to the public for review and feedback.
During today’s White House press briefing, Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs declined to comment on the investigation into Kundra’s old office.
Stay tuned.
Update 1: The U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia released some court documents related to today’s raid at the District of Columbia’s Office of the Chief Technology Officer.
The documents accuse D.C. employee, Yusuf Acar of conspiring with a contractor, Sushil Bansal, to steal from city taxpayers. Both Bansal, president of Advanced Integrated Technologies Corporation, and Acar were arrested today.
According to the documents, Acar, acting chief security officer for the D.C. government, allegedly approved work orders for products and services from Bansal’s company that were in excess of what the city actually received. The difference between the actual cost to Bansal’s company and what the D.C. government paid was split by the two defendants, according to the documents filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
Until February, the office where Acar worked was led by the new Federal Chief Information Officer, Vivek Kundra. Kundra is not mentioned in the court documents and sources said he is not under investigation.
View the original post after the jump.
Tags: chief information officer, FBI, Vivek Kundra
FBI salaries = wasteful pork?
February 3rd, 2009 | Congress Economic Stimulus | Posted by Stephen Losey
House Republicans yesterday unveiled a list of spending items in the stimulus bill that they called wasteful. One item in particular jumped out at me: “$75 million for salaries of employees at the FBI.”
Gregg Carlstrom last week highlighted Republican reluctance to pay for new cars for federal employees, but Republicans have also criticized many more line items affecting feds. Even though the construction industry is facing its own hardships in the economy, the GOP feels that building, renovating or repairing facilities at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institutes of Health, Homeland Security Department, State Department and Public Health Service would also be wasteful.
Tags: construction, FBI, Republicans, stimulus
FBI's Mark Felt, AKA Deep Throat, dead at 95
December 19th, 2008 | Justice | Posted by Stephen Losey
Mark Felt, the former associate director of the FBI who helped break the Watergate scandal, died yesterday at 95.
Felt, who for decades hid his role in the scandal and was known only as Deep Throat, was the consummate whistleblower. As a career agent and the number two man at the FBI, Felt had firsthand knowledge of how the Nixon administration tried to sabotage the Bureau’s investigation into the Watergate burglary. He used that information to guide Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein as they dug into the scandal.
Felt’s “Deep Throat” moniker, which was given to him by a Post editor, has since become a slang phrase for any well-placed source, especially one in the government.
Side note: Watergate aficionados can visit the parking space where Woodward and Felt held their late-night meetings in the bottom level of the parking garage at 1401 Wilson Blvd. in Arlington, Va.
In July, I met with Brad Bunn, the program executive officer in charge of the Pentagon’s National Security Personnel System, in his office at that location. As our interview began, Bunn told me about the garage’s historical importance. I then suggested that Bunn and I put on trenchcoats and continue the interview downstairs.
Bunn nixed my idea. “It’s way too hot for trenchcoats,” he said.
Tags: FBI, whistleblowers, White House
Business the Postal Service could do without
December 17th, 2008 | Postal Service State | Posted by Tim Kauffman
Update: Fifteen embassies have received envelopes containing white powder, State Department deputy spokesman Robert Wood said in a press briefing this morning in Washington.
The embassies are: Berlin; Bern, Switzerland; Brussels, Belgium; Bucharest, Romania; Copenhagen, Denmark; Dublin, Ireland;Â Luxembourg; Madrid, Spain; Oslo, Norway; Paris; Riga, Latvia; Rome; Stockholm, Sweden; Tallinn, Estonia; and The Hague, Netherlands.Â
Tests have come back negative in all cases save for The Hague, where results are still pending. Wood said the department has no information on a possible motive for the mailings.
Â
Looks like the U.S. Postal Service is busy sending more than just Christmas cards and packages this holiday season. Envelopes containing suspicious white powder have turned up at several U.S. embassies overseas and more than 40 governors’ offices stateside in the past week or so.
The white powder in each of the letters has been field tested and come back negative for any harmful material, the FBI said in a statement released this morning. All of the letters have been postmarked from Texas and are similar in nature, the FBI said. An ABC News report says 11 U.S. embassies in Europe have received the letters.
The FBI and Postal Inspection Service are investigating the case. Meanwhile, the FBI has told governors and the State Department to be on the lookout for additional letters.
Tags: embassies, FBI, letters, Postal Inspection Service