Feds order court records sealed for case that started Fast and Furious scandal

[chibajoe]

The Obama Administration has abruptly sealed court records containing alarming details of how Mexican drug smugglers murdered a U.S. Border patrol agent with a gun connected to a failed federal experiment that allowed firearms to be smuggled into Mexico.

http://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2011/nov/u-s-seals-court-records-border-patrol-s-murder

"These are not the documents that you are looking for, move along."

[Angry Dragon]

1. If there was any more transparency in this adminstration

we would not be able to see because it would be too dark

[ileus]

2. Uncle Sam is your friend...

[HereSince1628]

3. Why not admit to mistakes? Herman Cain does! And Rick Perry swears

that he isn't perfect and that he will make mistakes...

So why try to put-off the review that must inevitably come from History?

Oh..., nevermind.

[Hoyt]

4. Not unusual to seal such cases, especially if Osorio has turned informant.

So much for the conspiracy folks who hate the ATF.

[one-eyed fat man]

5. and they keep going back to Phoenix.

Attorney General Eric Holder said it’s not fair to assume that mistakes in Operation Fast and Furious led to Terry’s death.

Bill Newell, the SAC in charge of "Fast and Furious" sent regular e-mails, outside ATF and DOJ channels, to Kevin M. O'Reilly, then director of North American Affairs for the White House national security staff.

Here's a "hateful reich-wing source" for you to discount, the LA times.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-atf-guns-20110902,0,7480365.story

[rl6214]

6. Right, there was nothing wrong done

we'll just seal these records just for the hell of it.

[Hoyt]

9. Read excellent post #7 and maybe you will understand why case was sealed.

Has nothing to do with you guys' wild assertions of some kind of conspiracy to take your ever loving guns.

[DanTex]

7. Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't court records get sealed by judges...

...and not the "Obama administration". Unless you are blatantly trying to push the anti-Obama conspiracy angle, wouldn't it be more accurate to say "a federal judge has sealed court records..."

Oh wait, this is Judicial Watch, the right-wing group whose top "areas of interest" include "Exposing ACORN", "Investigating Elena Kagan's Involvement in Obamacare", "Pelosi Air Force Scandal", etc.

Are pro-gunners here really so blindly enamored by F&F conspiracy theories that even this right-wing propaganda is getting recced? Couldn't we at least find some non-right-wing news source that simply reports the facts -- that the court records were sealed by a judge without giving any reason, and that there are many reasons why records in a case like this might be sealed -- rather than all this accusatory and conspiratorial anti-Obama stuff?

Sadly, I can't say I'm surprised...



On edit, here's a version of this story that seems to be free of the anti-Obama stuff.

A federal judge has sealed the case against a man charged with murder in the killing of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. It's the only federal court case in which a weapon from the botched gun-walking program known as Operation Fast and Furious has turned up.
...
Professor Donald Downs teaches law at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He said federal judges can seal a murder case if it is still being investigated.

“There could be information that’s in that record that could give people ideas as to who a witness is, who’s involved. Things like that," Downs said.

http://www.fronterasdesk.org/news/2011/nov/15/atf-fast-furious-wide-receiver-holder-terry/

[AtheistCrusader]

8. Yeah, the AP hasn't picked up on it yet,

certainly not the 'obama sealed it' angle.

So I am reserving judgment. Judicial Watch was engineered to fuck with Clinton. It's an attack dog for the right wing republicans. It HAS bitten Bush's hands a few times, but nowhere near enough to give them a credible smokescreen of bipartisanship.

[gejohnston]

10. You are correct on this one

I'll have to check out fronterasdesk.org more. I read http://www.propublica.org/ and http://www.hcn.org/