Department of Justice Overstates the Number of Terror Cases

Federal prosecutors counted immigration violations, marriage fraud and drug trafficking among anti-terror cases in the four years after 9/11 even though no evidence linked them to terror activity, a Justice Department audit said Tuesday, February 20. Overall, nearly all of the terrorism-related statistics on investigations, referrals and cases examined were either diminished or inflated.^[1] All but two of the 26 statistics reviewed from October 2000 through September 2005 were incorrect.^[2]

Auditors looked at 26 categories of statistics - including numbers of suspects charged and convicted in terror cases, and terror-related threats against cities and other U.S. targets.^[3]
The report concluded that the department in most cases "could not provide support for the numbers reported or could not identify the terrorism link used to classify statistics as terrorism-related."^[4] Part of the problem, was that the Justice Department routinely counted criminal cases as terrorism-related even when prosecutors had found no links to terrorism.^[5]

A good portion of the problem stems from the definition the Justice Department uses for anti-terrorism cases.^[6] Security breaches at airports, for example, yielded arrests on immigration and false document charges, but no evidence of terrorist activity.^[7] Nonetheless, the attorneys' office grouped them with other anti-terror cases since they were investigated by federal Joint Terrorism Task Forces or with other counter-terror measures.^[8]

"The question I have now is whether the inaccuracies are an accident or if there was some other motive behind it," said U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, an Iowa Republican.^[9] Democrats and Republicans have accused the Justice Department of manipulating terrorism-related statistics to claim success in the war on terrorism and to argue for more resources.^[10]
"These inaccuracies are important because department management and Congress need accurate terrorism-related statistics to make informed . . . decisions," Inspector General Glenn Fine said in the report.^[11] The numbers are reported to Congress and the public and help shape the department's budget.^[12]

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^[1] Lara Jakes Jordan, Audit says terror case count not accurate, AP (via presstelegram.com), February 20, 2007
^[2] Marisa Taylor, Number of terrorism cases is exaggerated, audit reveals, McClatchy Newspapers (via Fort Worth Star-Telegram) February 20, 2007.
^[3] Id. (Compiled by the FBI, Justice's Criminal Division, and the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys).
^[4] Taylor, supra note 2.
^[5] Id.
^[6] The Department of Justice's Internal Controls Over Terrorism Reporting, Audit Report 07-20, February 20, 2007, http://www.usdoj.gov/oig/reports/plus/a0720/final.pdf. “EOUSA’s definition of the anti-terrorism program activity is not clear regarding the link to terrorism. The definition indicates the anti-terrorism program activity is meant to capture activity related to prevention or disruption of terrorist threats where the conduct is not obviously a crime of terrorism. However, the definition’s two examples indicate that the subject, target, or defendant must be reasonably linked to a terrorist activity to record the case under the anti-terrorism program activity. Taken as a whole, we believe this definition establishes that a case or defendant must have some identifiable link to terrorism to be categorized as being ‘anti-terrorism.’”
^[7] Jordan, supra note 1.
^[8] Id. (Other examples, according to the audit, included: Charges against a marriage-broker for being paid to arrange six fraudulent marriages between Tunisians and U.S. citizens; prosecution of a Mexican citizen who falsely identified himself as another person in a passport application; charges against a suspect for dealing firearms without a license, which a prosecutor said should not have been counted with anti-terrorism cases.)
^[9] Taylor, supra note 2.
^[10] Id.
^[11] Taylor, supra note 2.
^[12] Jordan, supra note 1.