U.S. Is Ordered to Investigate Use of Disputed Informant
By DEAN E. MURPHY
Published: August 23, 2005
SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 22 - A federal judge here ordered the Justice Department on Monday to investigate the continued use by the federal authorities of a Yemeni informant even though the man had revealed his undercover status and the names of two F.B.I. agents during a terror investigation in California.
The informant, identified in court as Essam Magid, was discharged by the Federal Bureau of Investigation in October 2002, after the improper conduct became known. Even so, Mr. Magid immediately resumed working for the Drug Enforcement Administration, which first recruited him as an informant in 1999 after he was arrested on drug conspiracy charges in a pseudoephedrine case.
Since then, the drug agency has paid Mr. Magid more than $77,000, helped to have the federal drug charges against him dismissed, and vouched for his reliability to other government agencies. Though he described himself as a Christian, Mr. Magid has been regarded as most useful to the authorities when posing in "the Muslim community," it was disclosed in court testimony.
Though details of the terror case are classified, the judge, Charles R. Breyer of Federal District Court, said Mr. Magid could have put the lives of the agents at risk and compromised the investigation.
The dispute provides a glimpse into the imperfect world law enforcement officials have encountered since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 in obtaining information from immigrant and Muslim populations in California and elsewhere, and the degree to which the officials are sometimes willing to look the other way when an informant trips up....
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/23/politics/23snitch.html
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