After one woman broke his heart, Khalil Abu Rayyan, a 21-year-old Michigan man, contemplated suicide. Then, when he confided his dark thoughts to another woman, she suggested he steer his violence toward other people.
Both women, it turned out, were FBI honeypots, and one of the recorded conversations with Rayyan entered into ongoing court proceedings provides a rare glimpse into how federal informants work.
The U.S. government now alleges that Rayyan, who has been indicted on federal gun charges, is an Islamic State sympathizer who talked of attacking a church in Detroit. Federal prosecutors have not filed terrorism-related charges, yet they are handling Rayyan’s indictment with the secrecy of a national security investigation.
The government has proposed a “limited protective order” that “would have kept sealed anything that even summarized material the government deemed sensitive,” according to a filing by the defense, which has so far refused to accept the proposal.
Based on those records now available, it appears the first FBI informant to enter Rayyan’s life was “Ghaada.” They struck up an intense relationship online, and even talked about marriage, children, and a life together.
When Ghaada called off the relationship, Rayyan was heartbroken. The FBI then introduced “Jannah Bride,” a 19-year-old Sunni Muslim who had a soft and charming accent when she spoke (in Arabic, Jannah means heaven).
“I love your voice, by the way,” Rayyan told her in one conversation.
To impress his new romantic interest, who appeared preoccupied with jihad, Rayyan claimed to have an AK-47 (he didn’t), and to have attempted travel to Syria (there’s no evidence he even bought a ticket).
Like Ghaada, Jannah Bride was an FBI informant.
An FBI recording of a conversation between Rayyan and Bride — which was obtained exclusively by The Intercept — shows how the FBI used Rayyan’s suicidal thoughts to manipulate him.
In a 15-minute call with Bride on February 2, Rayyan admitted that he was depressed and considering suicide.
“I’m tired of this,” Rayyan told her. “We’re doing the same thing every day.”
“You’re just saying that, right?” Bride asked. “Like, you didn’t plan anything?”
“I bought a rope this morning …” Rayyan answered. “It’s not that hard.”
“What do you mean it’s not that hard?” Bride followed. “It’s hard to take your own life, Khalil.”
Whether Khalil was suicidal or simply exhibiting attention-seeking behavior is unclear. But within a few minutes, the FBI informant deftly steered the conversation to violence against other people.
“Which thought is greater to you right now — hurting yourself or somebody else?” Bride asked.
“What is it?” he replied.
“Are you thinking about hurting yourself or somebody else?” Bride said.
“Well, I mean, I would not like to hurt somebody else,” Rayyan said. “But at the same time, if I did it to myself, it’d be easier. I wouldn’t get in trouble.”
Listen to the entire conversation between “Jannah Bride” and Rayyan.
A couple of months after the phone call, FBI agents searched Rayyan’s home and business, looking for the AK-47 he mentioned to Bride in one conversation. Federal agents found no trace of the assault rifle. Rayyan appears to have made up the story entirely to impress Bride.
Federal prosecutors instead charged Rayyan with unlawful possession of a handgun, which, according to his lawyer, he had obtained for self-defense while delivering pizzas in Detroit.
The government is refusing to turn over all communications between Rayyan and government informants. The FBI did not respond to The Intercept’s request for comment.
In a motion filed April 15, Rayyan’s lawyers, Todd Shanker and Benton C. Martin, wrote: “The government clearly exploited Rayyan, and blatantly attempted to steer him toward terrorism as an acceptable form of suicide before God.”
After his arrest, Rayyan told a psychologist: “I have never been touched by a girl in any way nor have I touched one.”
Top image: Screen grab from Exhibit C Conversation 1/25/16 between Rayyan and “Jannah Bride.”
Related: FBI Honeypot Ensnares Michigan Man
Nice article (though sad) about fbi entrapment of a sincere young man. the fbi will no doubt claim they have caught so many budding terrorists and have saved so many lives and ask for raises and more funding to increase their “valuable” efforts.
On the other hand your work is truly valuable. i wish you the very best in your valiant efforts to try to restore democracy in the usa.
We don’t know all the details of this case yet based on what is stated in this article it really makes you wonder why they would approach it this way. I think it places the agent in a bad situation as the case should be developed based solely on the probable cause of criminal behavior not developing it. It potentially brings a weak case to court and diverts vital resources away from those who would do real harm to the country and it citizens. Doing it differently would benefit the country, gov, it citizens and the agency.
This addresses a question I have been struggling with my whole adult life: How do I get my own honeypot? Let alone two?
Whom do I have to kill?
I second everything XKeyscore says about the FBI, InfraGard, and their evil stalking program that goes beyond anything George Orwell imagined.
They went in to find the AK-47 the kid talked about, found nothing, knew they screwed up and the unlawful possession of a handgun by someone working in an occupation where thugs will gladly murder you for the food you’re carrying in a decaying city known for being dangerous gave the FBI their way out of the mess.
From a constitutional angle: where is the “probable cause” of a past crime and where is the original warrant request, with the FBI agents testifying under penalty of perjury to a judge, before initiating a search of any kind?
Bush’s Preemption Policy is totally unconstitutional so where’s the original judicial warrant?
This doesn’t recommend the Honeypot profession much, either.
Honeypots? No: whores!
What most people do not realize that FBI and CIA have been using these tactics all over the world for a long time. Just like we make Ford or GMC Trucks we also make Terror. It is our best selling product. In this example they are using couple of women over the phone or over internet but internationally these meeting are face to face. Internationally it also more violent. CIA loves role play. They would kidnap a Sunni young man and take him back to a compound and pretend that his captors are Shias. They they will torture him for days and weeks even months. They will bring in his family and rape them and kill them right in front of him. They will humiliate him by keeping him naked (which is the worst thing you can to an Arab). Then they will let him go and have him hired by a shadow organization which is CIA created and funded with object of fighting Shai groups. They will do the same thing with the other side. That is just one tactic out of dozens. In another example He will leave his Captors in a car and while passing through a busy market that car would blow up.
If you think anything that i have described is totally fantastic (un real) then you really have no idea about the people who rule us. We are totally ignorant of their commitment to their cause. Image a version of history where German is run by Hitler but so is America, Europe and Japan. Now, in this version of history how you ever going to find out if somebody was sent to the Gas chambers.
If you beginning to see what i am saying then that is just a start. Situation is much worst. If somebody would like to follow the bread crumbs then as they say “All road leads to Rome” well in this case all roads lead to Israel.
Just out of curiosity, do you have any evidence for this? I’m not staying you are lying, but this is hard to believe.
The U.S. government is the largest and most deadly criminal organization in the world. This is one of thousands of examples of the evil it commits.
Our looted tax dollars working hard to enslave us. Long live the Empire!
Typical behavior from the thuggish FBI.
Note to the author Trevor Aaronson: Excellent article. Thank you for bringing this subject out into the open in such an honest and unbiased fashion.
What happened to the “patsy” in this brief story is now Standard Operating Procedure for the FBI, which uses these tactics against anyone whom they wish to isolate and destroy via “Soft-kill” elimination.
I will be Tweeting the URL for this article during business hours in the US.
Once again, thank you for such honest and unbiased reporting. You are an example for other journalists to follow in these censored times…
The FBI, DHS, InfraGard and brigade of paid criminal thugs are involved in a vicious, Post-9/11 COINTEL Program which employs Zersetzung tactics against innocent Americans.
For a full explanation of the National Security Racketeering Network’s illegal operations and American Citizen Soft-kill Elimination Program, check out XKeyscore’s Blog, dedicated to the FBI’s extra-judicial punishment and “potential” domestic threat termination campaign; which they have mounted against innocent Americans – at home and while they travel abroad:
https://www.intellihub.com/opinion/xkeyscoresblog/
The FBI selects individuals who they consider to be “potential domestic threats.”
They then destroy the target’s social network with false accusations of crimes of moral turpitude such as crimes of violence, rape, pedophilia and/or any other type of sexual deviancy.
They approach family members, friends, colleagues and co-workers, have them sign a non-disclosure agreement and then ask them to first monitor the “target” and then assist in his/her harassment.
Stalking, provocations, cyber-harassment, warrantless searches of residence/vehicle(s), theft, pet poisonings, rigged car accidents, vandalism and destruction of all personal relationships and contacts follows in an attempt to isolate the target.
Illegal entrapment operations soon follow. Normally sting operations require the target show a predisposition to commit a specific type of crime and that is how a legal basis is developed for the operation.
Not so with the FBI when they target a “potential domestic threat,” or “political subversive.” They will try absolutely anything to provoke the target, entrap him/her, get them to act out violently or engage in some type of illegal activity.
After they isolate the target by destroying his/her social network, reputation and revenue stream, they will increase attempts to goad/provoke the target, get him/her to engage in conversations which contain reference to violence/dangerous behavior to others.
This is an A to Z destruction-of-a-soul operation. It is intentional, they try to mentally, socially and financially break the target, deprive him/her of all contact, vilify him/her to family, friends, store owners/employees and neighbors through false accusations and then utterly destroy them.
These are a combination of Stasi techniques combined with GCHQ’s Joint Threat Intelligence Research Group (JTRIG) 5 D Strategy: Deny, Deceive, Degrade, Disrupt and Destroy.
The goal is to “Soft-kill” the target, which is a non-physical type of assassination which the FBI facilitates with the assistance of DHS, InfraGard, street thugs, criminals and illegal immigrants. All done in a fashion to allow for “plausible deniability.”
It is a sick, sub-human, sadistic and disgusting way to treat other humans and makes the East German Stasi’s Cold War activities look like a church picnic.
I think that nobody can’t underestimate what a man can do to get a woman . It depends on a persons iq and psychology if this works good or bad for other people .
Clearly in this case the man has a low self esteem after his previous online “relationship” and in his way to make a ” bond” with the new young girl he is expressing his need of moral help from her Maybe it’s a little bit too “fancy” in his expressions but certainly you can’t make fast conclusions about that and certainly you can’t get a man arrested because he said some bull##t. The title in this should be “fbi prevents suicide” , it’s unprofessional and not ethical to arrest someone in order to justify your salary .
There was a movie or tv show about a psychiatrist who had worked with the government in some sinister plot to mess with people’s heads and get them to do crazy things. The shrink went rogue and continued his research after the government stopped the program. The shrink learned that there were four “ingredients” needed to make someone snap and commit a heinous crime. 1 was a specific genetic mutation and another was tragic loss, like a job or a relationship or a loved one. I don’t remember what the other two were. But this story reminds of that show. I always wonder how those writers come up with these story lines.
Go after Hillary FBI clean up your act before you become a bigger shit stain on history. I used to look up to you guys when I was a kid. Disgusting traitor pigs.
I lived abroad for many years for the purpose of Ph.D. research. I was beset with assaults, thefts, vandalism, landlords acting strangely, entrapment operations, etc.
I had no idea that the source of all my issues was the FBI. When I returned to the U.S., the problems continued. I went to the FBI twice – expecting help. Only then did I realize that they were the ones that had facilitated all of my issues at home and abroad – which have cost me hundreds of thousands of dollars – and almost my life on several occasions.
I too looked up to and respected the FBI (and still do respect honest law enforcement personnel on federal/state/local levels). But now, like you, I am disgusted with these people who behave like thuggish, sub-human filth.
I face entrapment operations on a weekly basis, cyber-harassment, hate crimes, break-ins, theft, vandalism, the death of a pet (poisoning) and defamation of character via false accusations of crimes of moral turpitude to friends, family and neighbors.
I was raised to respect them, believe in them and expected that I would also work in conjunction with them once my education finished – in order to make our country a better place.
Little did I know that rogue groups of these individuals are the ones responsible for my duress and the hardship of tens of thousands of innocent Americans whose lives have been destroyed thru outrageous government conduct, extra-judicial punishment and RICO Act violations.
Knowing the truth (seeing the Matrix for what it really is) was a life-changing experience and these people truly are involved in activities which are considered treasonous.
I am also experiencing this harassment. Realizing what is going on is the first step but it took me five years. You are doing a great service Xkeyscore.
You can follow me @XKeyscore1 on Twitter. Follow me, re-Tweet and become part of the movement to put a halt to this thuggish behavior.
I don’t necessarily feel a lot safer, knowing the FBI is using honeypots to convince depressed people to become suicide bombers. Either they are very confident the target does not actually have the capability of following through on the plan, or they don’t care. Are they reckless or monstrous? The jury is still out.
I vote both.
Monstrous. They don’t care. If another suicide attack occurs, they know they will get more money and more power to further intimidate and repress people and ideas, and insert themselves and their sick agenda into the lives of citizens and into the “thoughts” of the nation. The way things are set up, they benefit from further terrorist attacks. Hence the staggering, almost unlimited arms sales to nations most specifically engaged in support of terrorists, and the concurrent attempts to lure more and more alienated marginalized individuals, many teetering on the borderline of emotional/psychological breakdown, into deranged terrorist “plots” cooked up, to fit the specific individual(s), by the FBI.
This is very similar to the idea and method of computing GDP currently floating through the neocon/neolib economic sphere; that any action or occurrence that creates a transfer of money, for any reason at all, adds to the GDP.
Such occurrences include natural disasters, like Katrina, from which the GDP
“benefitted” tremendously, (emergency services were put into action, houses needed to be rebuilt, schools needed to be rebuilt, medical costs needed to be paid, profit extracting charter schools were shoved in places where regular public schools existed before) even though lives and homes and livelihoods were destroyed up down and sideways. Disaster means profit. And profit “benefits” the GDP, even when extracted under the most horrific circumstances….
Same idea, though in this case, the currency is power, and the ability to control people’s lives and actions.
They are monstrous and sadistic. This behavior is not reckless – it is well-planned, intentional, sub-human and is standard operating procedure in the USA for the FBI.
They target tens of thousands of whistle-blowers and “potential” domestic threats with this grotesque, Stasi-styled activity.
This article, just like the recent 4 to 5 day publicity on those 28-redacted-pages from the 9/11 Commission Report and that Document 17, all tend to support Trump’s platform.
Certainly shouldn’t make one more favorable to allowing in Sunni refugees into America.
Plus, more and more wasted FBI time and money – – – when they should be fighting white-collar crime, for which prosecutions hit an all time low in 2015!
Oh dear, you’re not even wrong.
Intercept readers might be interested to know that sgt doom & general hercules star in their own comic strip.
It’s called “Feeble Failey” and it is syndicated in 168 newspapers.
Fun Fact: no one under the age of 37 has ever noticed the existence of this comic strip.
This article proves two things:
a) Muslim men lack character and are susceptible to suggestions.
b) Muslim women are treacherous and hide behind hijabs and niqabs and work for FBI.
Both are issues that the Muslim Jihadist as a community need to solve.
I think a few years of jail time will do them all some good. Maybe an alternative would be to throw them over the Great Trump Walls into Mexico and Canada.
General Hercules and sgt_doom are both sad, Far Reich racist nut jobs, and General Hercules spreads his own bran of bigoted Islamophobic hatred. the best thing to dois ignore them, and hopefully soon law enforcement will lock them up and throw away the key.
I wonder why all you Muslim and BLM people keep blaming the FBI when you should blame yourself for all the bad Islamic habits like suicide bombing and similar other terroristic tendencies.
Love to see my tax dollars put to good use.
C’mon, it’s just Business Development. What’s wrong with that? Only a communist could complain. ;-) The Marketing Dept. will have to keep a few hundred eyes on you from now on.
This FBI behavior is repugnant. They’ve taken a lonely young man and exacerbated his sense of isolation by adding profound betrayal to the mix.
He is lovely because you have known him for a long time then? Tell us more. What was he really like?
@charliethreeee, go back and re-read Mona’s post, paying close attention to the fourth word in the second sentence.
awww how cute… you pointed out a typo
fine, trade out lovely for lonely… i’m still curious to learn more about this guy since mona knows him so well
The article makes it clear he was lonely. The last paragraph if the article alone demonstrates this fact. Your reading comprehension scores must be really low.
I never said he wasn’t lonely. I am challenging Mona’s claim that the FBI investigated just to betray the life of an innocent, suicidal person. If Nick Turse has evidence that this person is innocent, surely he would have included that in the article.
Is this an example of entrapment? None of us know because the article does not specify what prompted the investigation.
“awww how cute… you pointed out a typo”
You are not getting off this easy. The smart thing to do would be to back off now that you have shown yourself incompetent.
But then that would be you, doing the smart thing. How likely is that. What a dumb shit you are and continue to prove yourself to be.
You are letting me off easy if your only evidence is an insult. I can easily dismiss those. Feel free to use evidence to outsmart me next time.
As Bubba points out, the article makes clear his loneliness.
“After his arrest, Rayyan told a psychologist: “I have never been touched by a girl in any way nor have I touched one.”
after
“They struck up an intense relationship online, and even talked about marriage, children, and a life together.”
This seems pretty damned blatant. And FBI attempts to use and abuse this to incite terrorism are simply revolting. They endanger the American public, not to mention the already precarious life and mental health of the “targeted” individual.
This is institutional sadism at its finest.
Please read my other comment(s) which is quite explanatory. This is standard operating procedure for the FBI against “political subversives” and whistle-blowers in the US at the present time.
They destroy an individual’s social network, family and revenue streams then work on isolating him/her and commencing to provoke and destroy like a pack of sadistic and rabid dogs.
Their behavior is demented and sub-human. At least in many third world countries, if you mind your own business the government will leave you alone.
Not so with the FBI, they hunt down people to isolate, provoke and destroy.
There are a lot of good federal employees (FBI, DHS, CIA, etc.), but there are some radical and rogue groups which behave with an intent which is diabolic and destructive.
They foment and facilitate anger and destruction without cause and are terrorizing tens of thousands of innocent Americans.
This charliethreeee has beclowned himself many times in comments here, with rank errors of fact and inane “reasoning.” But this one touches very close; I’ve worked with the mentally ill including those suffering from suicidal ideation. (Suicidal ideation is not necessarily or always a symptom of mental illness; some people become so overwhelmed by cascading, adverse life events they simply cannot contemplate continuing to suffer.)
Law enforcement is trained how to handle such suffering individuals, and they do not approach them as if they are homicidal. this training includes discouraging them from simply dismissing such civilians as “losers” who “just can’t deal with life.” They are now trained in compassion, which has been a long time coming.
What the FBI did to this lonely and isolated young man, who appears to have been experiencing suicidal ideation, is obscene. No human being should be subjected to such cruelty, certainly not one for whom there is not strong evidence of a realistic conspiracy to harm to others.
“Law enforcement is trained how to handle such suffering individuals, and they do not approach them as if they are homicidal.”
You said your son and uncle are police officers but you refuse to ask them if they were trained the same way I was. You claim they were not trained that way simply because you do not respect my opinion. Then you go on to post a link that does not back up your claim.
I am not an expert at this. I am simply telling you that that is how I was trained. But feel free to be as closed-minded as you desire. You could reach out to your family and perhaps they would tell you something you did not previously know.
They’re a bunch of racist clowns who couldn’t catch a real criminal if they tried.
> This FBI behavior is repugnant.
The Ministry of Love will send a wagon to your door soon.
Seriously, the FBI should be disbanded and the whole sadass club stripped of pension payouts. Behaviour worthy of a Stalinist regime has been standard operating procedure since Edgar Hoover The Sociopath created his power trip outfit.
somebody pretending to me be… that’s actually flattering, thanks!
at least i am making some of you think creatively
Since 9/11 there have been over 15 million violent crimes in America yet there has not been one Islamic terrorist attack since. The 2 attacks were lone wolfs but even if you count those that would be 2 crimes out of 15 million. You can’t have a high threat without having a high rate but the United States of terror along with Jewish Hollywood have made the threat as high as someone taking a deep breath.
When will you wake up?
The FBI also built the bomb used in the WTC attack. The FBI had an informant who recordered all his conversations. During the trial the FBI revealed surveillance video of the bomb being built in an FBI warehouse. The FBI chose to use real explosives over fakes. The white terrorists create terror and then cry of a potential attack. The sheeple of the USA will never awaken as they are in a state of reality self endulgence comma.
This method of “ensnaring” people has already been tested in court and ruled illegal because it is “entrapment”. Yet i see this is still going on. wtf.
Hence FBI’s objections to having their evidence shown in court.
Horrible. Racist. Predatory and exploitive.
whoa! That is the crime of precipitation of…..
the U.S. has no laws on the books for this manner of producing offences and congress depends on this for their criminal ways. The murder of Fred Hampton and JFK was just the beginning for all the protectors of the bankers who run the largest ongoing crime on the planet. And they should be charged with theft and precipitation of poverty, war and murder.
We are living in a society governed by Xenophobic, warmongering, self-centered, conceited sickos. This is to be first accepted, then changed.
Is the FBI doing the same thing to white potential domestic terrorists? Can any of the FBI monitoring this comment section provide an answer?
We can neither confirm nor deny this matter.
Yes and no.
Yes.
See the biker slaughter last May in Waco.
This is SOP with anyone on the USA who is an activist, “potential” domestic terrorist, whistle-blower, “political subversive,” politically outspoken, etc. The list goes on.
The National Security Racketeering Network (FBI, NSA, DHS, InfraGard and civilian thugs) are spending billions of dollars a year, targeting innocent Americans with what amounts to RICO Act violations.
For more info – there are a plethora of articles on this topic which can be found here: http://bit.ly/23Ig4cV
Why aren’t these people brought up on ethics charges?
Because bringing them ALL up on charges would have a chilling effect on law enforcement S…
If thats your REAL name…
There’s much worse to come. This is just the tip of the iceberg, as I’m sure the author knows.
(Thanks.)
Technically the guy is being prosecuted for “being a marijuana user in possession of a gun”. And to be fair, neither the marijuana nor the gun came from the FBI nor were they urged by the informant. All this plotting-terrorism crap is just a sizzle soundtrack played behind a humdrum steak.
It looks like the real problem here is mostly anti-drug laws and their long shadow of weird regulations. There are lots of altogether non-jihadist stoners hit with the same kind of bogus charge. See http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/19/medical-marijuana-gun-rights_n_5513152.html – I guarantee you that people are more willing to repeal the law this charge was made under based on five innocent members of a family that was growing medical marijuana, than on behalf of a professed jihadist.
Given this awful law exists, the only actual possible reward of the “honeypots” for their effort is they can ruin any chance for a reduced sentence and make the sentence a full prison term. But there are all kinds of little prejudices that could do that, and willingness to come on to a woman as a jihadist isn’t the most outrageous of them.
Upon closer examination of the informant, THAT IS NO INFORMANT. “That” is a contracted professional. The professionals the bureau uses are well educated, probably well paid, and follow a scripted program. They do this all the time, this is not a unique situtation. It’s a program called LURENET.
Potentially, http://www.lurenet.com could have some trademark concerns with that.
You’re right, of course – I remember the “drug casanova” cases from 30 years ago: https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=1901&id=pekpAAAAIBAJ&pg=3970,3985138&hl=en etc. By this point this thing has gone on so long that this is simply what I take is meant by the word “informant”.
Seems to me this would qualify as pimping.
The FBI uses minors for sex stings and entrapment operations in the cases of “potential domestic threats” even if the “targets” have never shown a predisposition (a requirement for a legal sting operation) to engage in any type of illegal activity with a minor.
This is all standard operating procedure today, in the USA, by the FBI, when attempting to (illegally) nail “political subversives,” whistle-blowers and “potential domestic threats.”
This is accompanied by stalking, defamation of character, break-ins, theft and hard-core cyber-harassment which includes identity theft and setting up bogus social networking accounts in the target’s name.
These operational tenets are borrowed from the Stasi and GCHQ’s Joint Terrorist Research Intelligence Group.
There is nothing legal about these operations. The FBI engages in activities which run counter to the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act in order to destroy the lives of innocent Americans – all in the name of annual budget increases and “Keeping ‘Murica Safe.”
It’s disgusting.
Yes, and Ghaada means beautiful. Clearly Khalil Abu Rayyan was a budding Muslim terrorist; He owned a gun, smoked marijuana, lied for the hope of love, and aspired for “beautiful heavenly” virgins; such atypical behavior warrants the fullest attention of Homeland security. Thank Obama for the United Stasi of America.
Let’s thank bush for 911 and the death of 6k American solders all on lies. Cheney made billions off the blood on Americans. Never forget white terrorism. The only reason why whites are the majority is because they killed and enslaved everyone else.
Sorry Thomas, I have been baited by trolls far more compelling than you.
hey fool, The United States of America is responsible, support for the war was gleeful and as stupid as all the other times when war fever strikes the whole country — this whole blame it all on Bush & Cheney thing lets way too many other guilty people off the hook.
Dare I point out not all of these Americans cheering on the war were white either….
… same goes for the beneficiaries (not all white) – although i’m not sure why the skin pigmentation properties of the beneficiary is relevant (… and Karl, are you calling me a troll?).
“Thank Obama for the United Stasi of America.”
Hold on there Chief. I’m no fan of Obama, but: a President can do nothing without powerful minions; with powerful minions, he (read “Executive Branch”) can do anything and neither SCOTUS nor the Congress can prevent it, stop it, or punish it short of impeachment. Executive Branch = DHS, FBI, CIA, DIA, ONI, ATF, ICE, Secret Service, EPA, BLM, OSHA, a military the worst scumbags in history would drool over, and the Department of Justice (sic) for starters. This wasn’t Obama’s idea.
FBI skulduggery has been going on since LONG before Obama. Entrapment, misfeasance, malfeasance and incompetence in the lab, testi-lying, etc.
The head of the FBI is appointed by the President. If Obama did not like the performance of the acting head then he could simply replace him; the White House sets the tone:
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/09/blogtalk-obamas-fisa-vote/?_r=0
More of the same is change that you can believe in.
What a specious and foolish argument.
The Intercept has posted lots of stories exactly like this and each time, the comments section explodes about how the evil government is entrapping depressed people rather than focusing on real terrorists.
If this person was suicidal and owned a gun, the government may have saved his life. Also, suicidal and homicidal are almost one in the same. This person appears worth investigating to me. Before the FBI sent in the pretty girls, there was some probable cause that is not mentioned in this article for some reason. Why? Why are you starting this story with the honeypot? What led to the FBI sending in the girls?
“What led the FBI sending in those girls?”
Well, this is the problem of our government having access to our information. Manipulators, and these people are exactly that, know how to get you to do what they want when they know your likes and dislikes, fears etc.. Maybe he was doing something totally innocent and they flagged him? Not maybe I’m sure he was innocent
Correction-the last sentence should read “Not maybe, I’m sure he IS innocent.”
You do not know why but you are sure why. Nice!
“What led to the FBI sending in the girls?” It would appear that him being a lone muslim youth led to it. How’s that for profiling?
So now the FBI should investigate any suicidal person? Or is that just suicidal Muslims? Are you even aware of the kind of breach of civil liberties you’re proposing?
How about this for “entrapping depressed people” or for asking some actually relevant questions: Why did the first FBI informant break up with Kahlil? Was it just a coincidence or was it intentional, in order to try and push him to a breaking point? If that’s the case it’s a pretty sickening variant of psychological torture, in addition to “entrapping depressed people.”
I’m not sure how you can look at an FBI informant encouraging a depressed man to kill other people instead of just committing suicide as anything other than unethical and immoral.
Assuming you know why the FBI originally started investigating = you don’t know the answer ergo why are you criticizing me for bringing that subject up?
Oh yea, because unless you are commenting to say great article, you are labeled and assumed to be the enemy.
Don’t flatter yourself.
You’re not an enemy, (except possibly to yourself.)
You’re an attention whore who says remarkably stupid things to provoke a response from decent people quite flummoxed by the indecency of the FBI (in this case.)
Of course when you attempt to defend the indefensible, people will fuss with you. That’s your joy. Good for you.
But including the response I cite here, I haven’t seen a comment you’ve made worth a response beyond, “what a clown!”
You flatter me simply by responding.
Feel free to explain why my point is indefensible. Here I will make it simple for you: why are you assuming this guy was not worth investigating? The FBI did not know he was not a threat until they investigated.
I concede that using a honeypot to get somebody to spew jihad is shady. For all of you thinking otherwise, you are wrong. I am simply saying that it’s not logical to claim this was not worth investigating without some evidence to explain why.
Given the scale of corruption on Wall Street and in politics, why didn’t the FBI using such aggressive ‘honeypot’ tactics to go after Wall Street executives involved in the 2008 economic collapse, or after U.S. Congressmembers who take bribes from the Saudis and other foreign despots? Why not use the girls to set up mid-level traders and bankers at Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan on cocaine charges, threaten them with long prison terms, and then offer them plea deals if they would testify against their bosses? That seems like an effective strategy, doesn’t it? They could send Goldman’s Lloyd Blankfield and JP Morgans’ James Dimon to prison for organized white-collar crime in the runup to the 2008 collapse, they certainly deserves it.
The FBI’s refusal to do that points to widespread corruption within the the FBI, i.e., those are the interests the FBI works for. Consider: we have an Obama-appointed FBI Director – Jame Comey – whose job resume includes working for Lockheed Martin for years (whose biggest foreign client is Saudi Arabia) , and serving as an advisor to HSBC, who launders billions in Sinaloa cartel money and, when caught, gets a ‘deferred prosecution agreement’ from Loretta Lynch, the Obama-appointed head of the Justice Department. If that’s not gross corruption, what is?
I think the most realistic explanation is the the FBI executives who oversee these honeypot operations are careerists who hope to gain advancement by making headline-grabbing arrests; and if they went after Wall Street or the Saudis, they’d have no hope for lucrative post-government careers working for those operations. That’s where FBI executives go after they leave the agency – Wall Street law firms (Mueller), shady credit card companies (Freeh at MBNA), etc.
At the FBI, you have a lot of blowhard self-promoters trying to climb the corporate ladder, lazy bureaucrats going with the flow, and outright corrupt Hoover-STASI types who are obsessed with snooping on the general American public – and those are the people who set the agency’s agenda.
why the FBI did not use hot chicks to lure banksters = something benito should have come up with… it would have been funny had he written it
No, that’s incorrect – you see, in a fascist state the banks play important roles, such as financing the fascist politicians and providing safe havens to stash one’s loot in (as with the Swiss banks and the Nazis) , and are certainly not going to be subject to any kind of Gestapo persecution, as long as they remain cooperative:
“Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power”
– Benito Mussolini
Corporatism is Fascism, and what we are experiencing now in the West is the merger of Elite global corporate power with governments, the military, security agencies, and utilising pervasive and intrusive technologies to deliver the agenda. Democracy is a sham, and our governments no longer serve the interests of their electorate – they have been bought by the elite and their corporations, and have become nothing more than corrupt, imperialist, terrorist police states with their dirty wars of profit.
Probably because the FBI was not willing to put up sufficient money to eclipse the funds the execs were willing to put up on their own behalf. They weren’t willing to outbid a Wall Street salary for the questionable ability to put away some of America’s best and brightest “go-getters”.
Why prosecute them? They’re just good capitalists, merely after making a buck or a hundred million…The fact that they destroyed the economy and lives of millions makes not one jot of difference. They did so in pursuit of the buck, and are thus God’s favored children.
As has been attributed to FDR, “they’re sons of bitches”, but they’re our sons of bitches”…
Then, where does the FBI loyalty really lie? With the American public or with those who will pay them off after they leave their government jobs? What about the loyalty of Congressmembers who get multi-million dollar donations to their private foundations (Saudi Arabia gave Hillary Clinton’s foundation $10 million and John McCain’s foundation $1 million)?
Whose ‘sons of bitches’ are they really? Not ‘ours’, I don’t think.
Suicidal and homicidal are nothing even close to the sam . How dare you.
The next time you have contact with a police officer, see what he or she thinks about that.
As a cop ride-along, I can tell you that you are completely wrong.
I am not 100% sure I am right and have already conceded that point. I have stated that that is how I was trained in the academy. You are aware that a cop ride along does not mean you know how officers are trained yet? Even if your training is different that does not mean I wasn’t trained that way.
Police training is not universal.
The FBI apparently had the depraved desire to elide the two, turn one into the other.
Nonsense. Where are all the comments?
Yea you are right… there was not an explosion of comments about how wrong my theory is. Haha.
You start with a hypothesis. That appears to be where you seem stuck, apparently finding reality diverges significantly, not that a troll like you would notice,
Excuse me while I file this under the same category as other bullshit, such as “the purpose of globalization is to lift people out of poverty.”
i never said that was their intent or the purpose of the intervention. had i said that, than you would have been justified in calling me out
That’s both false and outrageous. And before you tell me to “ask a cop,” I have both an uncle and a son in that club. Neither would make such a stupid assertion.
I’ve also worked with individuals having suicidal ideation. People who spread such malignant bullshit about these suffering people are very harmful.
Feel free to ask either your son or your uncle and then you can come back and claim they said I was full of shit. Until that time, your “my son would never make such a stupid assertion” is simply an assumption.
I’m not making an assumption. learned that concept at the police academy. (And no, I am not an officer. I just thought about it back in the day.)
It is not necessary for me to inquire of either man about what some malignant and ill-informed person said online. I already know the answer because I’ve been involved in activities involving, and assessing, law enforcement response to the suicidal subject.
I never really said it was necessary. I said if you want to say I am wrong you could at least produce some evidence to support why and in this case that is not possible. You have no means to dispute that while I was in the academy, that is what they taught. Now you could ask your family members if they were trained the same way and report back but apparently you discount everybody who disagrees with you. Since you are so smart, anybody who disagrees must be stupid, right? Pretty sure that is the textbook definition of being closed minded.
You and lots of others are laser sighting on that one sentence I wrote which is somewhat irrelevant to the actual point i tried to make but I digress… it’s duly noted that you have zero interest in debating this respectfully.
‘Also, suicidal and homicidal are almost one in the same.’
You are talking out of your arse, and you know it. You come over as a little shit head that knows very little about life but is full of opinions. While it’s okay to have opinions, it’s still always better to have facts to back it up with. Go live life a bit then come back and see if you are still so full of judgement of those you know little about.
Your quote is not wholly relevant to the point I tried to make: why are so many of you assuming this was not worth investigating?
Go back and read my post. If you can’t get beyond the quote, fine, ignore that part. My main point was a question, not really an opinion and nobody has answered my question yet… even after all this yammering about how the quote could be wrong.
You are either a troll, a paid shill or a government employee.
If you read articles by the attorney who heads up the Rutherford Institute (http://bit.ly/1poi0EV) or publications by the ACLU (http://bit.ly/1Sy9fCq) , you would discover that the FBI runs illegal entrapment operations, not legal “sting” operations based on probable cause with the target(s) showing a “predisposition” (the necessary element for a legal sting) to commit a crime.
This is SOP for the FBI in the US. The target innocent people and set them up illegally, often after isolating them and attempting to provoke them to engage in violence or criminal activity.
Probable cause? LOL. You think the rogue factions within the FBI operate within legal bounds? That is a frigging joke. They behave like the Gestapo.
If they have probable cause of a predisposition, how is that illegal in any form other than what is in your mind? Isn’t it up to the courts to determine what is legal and not you?
We can fight to change the law, and I empathize with you on that, but what you are describing is not illegal yet.
Being lonely and being Muslim (or a Hindu or Christian for that matter) does not display intent to engage in criminal activity.
As other people have said – in many other articles, the FBI is creating the entire scenario from A to Z.
Lonely guy. They set him up with a girl. She breaks up with him. They stick in a second agent provocateur to egg him on and provoke him.
Why was he upset in the first place? Because the FBI realized he wasn’t experienced, wanted companionship, held that bait in front of his face, yanked it away, and brought in a secondary agent to ratchet up the tension.
This displays a stream of FBI-generated escalations – which is what whistleblowers and activists are going through every day in the US.
Other scenario – destroy someone’s family/relationships via lies and misinformation, egg them on and then get people to offer a weapon to the “potential” threat.
The FBI is engaging in Zersetzung operations. Don’t know what that is? Look up Zersetzung and you will see how 95%+ of all DHS/FBI operations are geared.
Just in case you read comments multiple days after publication like I do:
The author of the article did not tell us why the FBI got involved. You are assuming the FBI created this scenario. If saying that makes me J Edgar Hoover in your eyes, than I suggest you take a chill pill or at least smoke some weed and relax. I am not J Edgar Hoover.
Rather than feed into your baiting, I have a question for you: Regardless of why the FBI was involved (be it reasonable or not) what would you suggest is a graceful way to *end* this sort of operation and when? For the sake of argument can you admit that it might be possible he was NOT likely to act without goading and answer that? While I personally disagree with you what I’ve noticed in so many, if not most, of these cases is — once someone has this level of attention placed upon them, the ‘operations’ rarely end until the organizations responsible get what they want. And if they don’t we NEVER — and more importantly, the *targets* of said operations never — get to find out or seek reparations. If LEA gets a free pass and no-harm-no-foul *if* they are willing to walk away, what is to keep them from engaging, willy-nilly, in these sorts of operations other than simply a matter of resources?
My god these people are sick!
What’s the matter with this woman on the tape?
They really are sick. If the democrats supposedly in charge of the executive branch had any decency, they would put a stop to this. And it’s only going to be worse under Trump or Hillary. We have lost our damned mind as a country.
Yes, either Trump or Clinton will continue US police agencies current policies and, likely, current personnel. They will continue with what “works” (for them) while preying on the most vulnerable citizens. They need enemies to justify their salaries and positions.
Here we see them creating those “enemies.”
They won’t stop of their own accord. Why would they?
Clearly the woman on this tape lacks even the slightest hint of an individual conscience. She has exchanged her personal identity for an institutional identity — a common exchange made these days both in private and public service.
What is an institutional identity?
Let me allow Herr Eichmann to brag about his dedication:
My heart was light and joyful in my work, because the decisions were not mine.
and
Over the years I learned which hooks to use to catch which fish.
and
Regret is something for little children.
Here is an institutional being, heart and soul, devoted to the institutional cause (whatever cause that may be.)
“We have lost our damned mind as a country.”
We certainly have.
Many people have no idea how bad things really are.
Good point – as Prof. emeritus Peter Dale Scott exposed Dick Cheney put the U.S. on “C.O.G.” after 9/11 – “continuity of government” which includes mass concentration camps for citizens who are not “for” the U.S. empire. The F.B.I. routinely uses provocative informants to create false charges – as the PBS documentary “Better this World” exposed – and the police/military will just murder activists as the FBI did to the Black Panthers and to A.I.M. – American Indian Movement. Damn – jet fighter planes on standby for the police imperialist army take over at the Republican National Convention! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eikSbHLgftY “Better this world” doc on FBI informant creating terrorists, once again. “False flag” operations are standard for U.S. imperialism – domestic or on the periphery – like CIA false flag Operation Gladio terrorism in Europe against the working class there. CIA uses Nazi false flag terrorism in Latin America also. CIA and FBI worked domestically as “Operation Chaos” to create the list of activists to put into concentration camps – promoted by the great liberal Hubert H. Humphrey as “national security.” Why does the U.S. have the greatest number of people incarcerated in the world? Not to mention 9/11 itself was organized by an FBI informant – Mohammed Ali – and the hijackers he trained were protected by the CIA and other FBI informants. The airport in Venice Beach Florida that trained the hijackers was busted for importing heroin as Daniel Hopsicker exposed. Not to mention the Muslim Brotherhood was created by the CIA and then used to set up recruitment mosques in the U.S. for the terrorist army in Afghanistan and then the “database” was used by the CIA for Yugoslavia – the same protected CIA terrorists. The whole “War on Terror” is as fake as the “War on Drugs” when the CIA uses assets to fly in the drugs to protected airports in the U.S.