Report: Whistleblower Office Fails to Protect Air Marshals

[Hissyspit]

Source: Pro Publica

HOMELAND SECURITY
Report: Whistleblower Office Fails to Protect Air Marshals

by Michael Grabell, ProPublica - November 25, 2008 7:00 am EST

After a ProPublica investigation found that dozens of air marshals have been charged with crimes, the director of the Air Marshal Service sent an agency-wide e-mail (PDF) stating, "We must dedicate ourselves to root out and report any instance of misconduct or criminal behavior."

But a new report being released today (Tuesday, Nov. 25) by a government watchdog group, the Project on Government Oversight, says that current and former air marshals have been shut out and retaliated against when they tried to report problems to the U.S. Office of Special Counsel, an independent federal agency that protects whistleblowers. "The POGO report describes in great detail what actually happens to federal air marshals when they do come forward to root out misconduct and criminal behavior,” said P. Jeffrey Black, a Las Vegas air marshal and whistleblower. After he testified before Congress in 2004 about security breaches, Black says the air marshal service launched an investigation into whether he released sensitive information.

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The Office of Special Counsel is supposed to be a refuge for government whistleblowers -- a place where complaints of corruption, abuses of power and security lapses are aired and exposed. POGO cited interviews with nearly a dozen current and former air marshals to assert that the agency has closed cases without investigating and failed to shield whistleblowers from retaliation.

The report places much of the blame on Special Counsel Scott Bloch. Bloch went on administrative leave in October, five months after the FBI raided his home and office as part of an investigation into obstruction of justice. One of the accusations is that Bloch hired Geeks on Call (instead of the agency's computer technicians) to perform a "seven-level wipe" and erase all the files on his office computer. Bloch has said he was trying to get rid of a virus.

Read more: http://www.propublica.org/article/report-whistleblower-office-fails-to-protect-air-marshals-1125