The FBI's Criminal Enforcement is Gutted; Con Artists Flourish

By Scott Horton

Attorneys General Ashcroft and Gonzales decided to deploy thousands of FBI agents around the country to work on counter-terrorism projects, drawing down on resources which otherwise would be available to address fraud and other white-collar crime without replacing them, according to a special report by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. The result has been a dramatic collapse in white-collar crime prosecutions across the country, with no offsetting increase in counterterrorism-related prosecutions.

• Overall, the number of criminal cases investigated by the FBI nationally has steadily declined. In 2005, the bureau brought slightly more than 20,000 cases to federal prosecutors, compared with about 31,000 in 2000—a 34 percent drop.
• White-collar crime investigations by the bureau have plummeted in recent years. In 2005, the FBI sent prosecutors 3,500 cases—a fraction of the more than 10,000 cases assigned to agents in 2000. In Western Washington, the drop has been even more dramatic. Records show that the FBI sent 28 white-collar cases to prosecutors in 2005, down 90 percent from five years earlier.

Scam artists know they are unlikely to be targeted by a criminal investigation and prosecuted under the Gonzales Justice Department.

White-collar crimes often affect the people least able to afford it—lower-income and elderly people, according to Peter Henning, a former Justice prosecutor who teaches law at Wayne State University in Detroit. "If you keep it small, and act quickly and get out of the jurisdiction, you can avoid being prosecuted," he said. "Scam artists know that."

Large numbers of FBI agents also were transferred out of violent-crime programs because bureau officials knew that local police—who have overlapping jurisdiction in violent crimes—would have to help.

The retired FBI official said the Bush administration is forcing the bureau to "cannibalize" its traditional crime-fighting units in the name of fighting terrorism. "The administration is starving the criminal program," the former official said.