- Jan 15, 2013
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DOJ in court arguing they have the right to impersonate you, use your family and you for far more dangerous undercover work, regardless if you have not had your day in court yet.
Their logic is if we arrest you we have the right to use your identity and impersonate you. There seems to be little regard for the person(s) who they do this too nor their families lives. This is in court now, and the lady who filed the lawsuit hadn't even had her court date yet, before they went through her smartphone and made a fake facebook account and plastered her racy nude photos on it, and her children..then started communicating with very dangerous individuals online using her identity.
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Even in the registry of horrible things government agents have done in the name of the drug war, this Buzzfeed report stands out:
The Justice Department is claiming, in a little-noticed court filing, that a federal agent had the right to impersonate a young woman online by creating a Facebook page in her name without her knowledge. Government lawyers also are defending the agents right to scour the womans seized cellphone and to post photographs including racy pictures of her and even one of her young son and niece to the phony social media account, which the agent was using to communicate with suspected criminals.
The woman, Sondra Arquiett, who then went by the name Sondra Prince, first learned her identity had been commandeered in 2010 when a friend asked about the pictures she was posting on her Facebook page. There she was, for anyone with an account to see posing on the hood of a BMW, legs spread, or, in another, wearing only skimpy attire. She was surprised; she hadnt even set up a Facebook page . . .
The account was actually set up by U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration special agent Timothy Sinnigen.
Not long before, law enforcement officers had arrested Arquiett, alleging she was part of a drug ring. A judge, weighing evidence that the single mom was a bit player who accepted responsibility, ultimately sentenced Arquiett to probation. But while she was awaiting trial, Sinnigen created the fake Facebook page using Arquietts real name, posted photos from her seized cell phone, and communicated with at least one wanted fugitive all without her knowledge.
The Justice Departments headquarters in Washington, D.C., referred all questions to the DEA, which then declined to answer questions and, in turn, referred inquiries to the local U.S. attorneys office in Albany, New York. That office did not respond to multiple requests for an interview . . .
Meanwhile, the bogus Facebook page remains accessible to the public, BuzzFeed News found.
The DOJ filing was in response to Arquietts lawsuit. Consider what the federal government is arguing here. Its arguing that if youre arrested for a drug crime, including a crime unserious enough to merit a sentence of probation, the government retains the power to (a) steal your identity, (b) use that identity for drug policing, thus making your name and face known to potentially dangerous criminals, (c) interact with those criminals while posing as you, which could subject you to reprisals from those criminals, (d) expose photos of your family, including children, to those criminals, and (e) do all of this without your consent, and with no regard for your safety or public reputation.
The mindset that would allow government officials to not only engage in this sort of behavior, but to then fight in court to preserve their power to continue it is the same mindset that, for example, allows drug cops to compel juveniles and young women to become drug informants, with little regard for their safety and to then make no apologies when those informants are murdered. Or that would lead campus cops to let a teen slowly kill himself with heroin, because they could hold his addiction over his head to force his cooperation as an informant. Or that would allow a guy arrested on a possession charge to be abandoned for days in a jail cell, nearly killing him.
For decades now, politicians, law enforcement officials, and drug warriors have spent a great deal of time, energy, and propaganda dehumanizing drug offenders. It shouldnt be all that surprising, then, when drug enforcement officials subsequently treat drug offenders as something less than human. If you arent fully human, you have no identity to steal. Or at the very least, your claim to your identity isnt as important the public good the government might do by stealing it. (In this case, public good means arresting a few drug pushers.) Likewise, less-than-human lives are more easily expended than human ones. A drug cop wouldn't dream of sending his own kid out as an informant. But once a kid gets caught possessing some pot or ecstasy or speed or God forbid selling it the kid lost the right to be treated like a fully realized human being. The cops are willing to take some risks.
I dont think the DEA wants Sondra Arquiett to be victimized by the criminals with whom they interact while pretending to be her. It also seems safe that drug cops didn't want to see Rachel Hoffman, Daniel Chong, Jonathan Magbie, Chad MacDonald, Logan, or Michael Saffioti to die. Its more that once they were known to be drug offenders, their lives weren't quite as important.
Their logic is if we arrest you we have the right to use your identity and impersonate you. There seems to be little regard for the person(s) who they do this too nor their families lives. This is in court now, and the lady who filed the lawsuit hadn't even had her court date yet, before they went through her smartphone and made a fake facebook account and plastered her racy nude photos on it, and her children..then started communicating with very dangerous individuals online using her identity.
------------------------------------
Even in the registry of horrible things government agents have done in the name of the drug war, this Buzzfeed report stands out:
The Justice Department is claiming, in a little-noticed court filing, that a federal agent had the right to impersonate a young woman online by creating a Facebook page in her name without her knowledge. Government lawyers also are defending the agents right to scour the womans seized cellphone and to post photographs including racy pictures of her and even one of her young son and niece to the phony social media account, which the agent was using to communicate with suspected criminals.
The woman, Sondra Arquiett, who then went by the name Sondra Prince, first learned her identity had been commandeered in 2010 when a friend asked about the pictures she was posting on her Facebook page. There she was, for anyone with an account to see posing on the hood of a BMW, legs spread, or, in another, wearing only skimpy attire. She was surprised; she hadnt even set up a Facebook page . . .
The account was actually set up by U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration special agent Timothy Sinnigen.
Not long before, law enforcement officers had arrested Arquiett, alleging she was part of a drug ring. A judge, weighing evidence that the single mom was a bit player who accepted responsibility, ultimately sentenced Arquiett to probation. But while she was awaiting trial, Sinnigen created the fake Facebook page using Arquietts real name, posted photos from her seized cell phone, and communicated with at least one wanted fugitive all without her knowledge.
The Justice Departments headquarters in Washington, D.C., referred all questions to the DEA, which then declined to answer questions and, in turn, referred inquiries to the local U.S. attorneys office in Albany, New York. That office did not respond to multiple requests for an interview . . .
Meanwhile, the bogus Facebook page remains accessible to the public, BuzzFeed News found.
The DOJ filing was in response to Arquietts lawsuit. Consider what the federal government is arguing here. Its arguing that if youre arrested for a drug crime, including a crime unserious enough to merit a sentence of probation, the government retains the power to (a) steal your identity, (b) use that identity for drug policing, thus making your name and face known to potentially dangerous criminals, (c) interact with those criminals while posing as you, which could subject you to reprisals from those criminals, (d) expose photos of your family, including children, to those criminals, and (e) do all of this without your consent, and with no regard for your safety or public reputation.
The mindset that would allow government officials to not only engage in this sort of behavior, but to then fight in court to preserve their power to continue it is the same mindset that, for example, allows drug cops to compel juveniles and young women to become drug informants, with little regard for their safety and to then make no apologies when those informants are murdered. Or that would lead campus cops to let a teen slowly kill himself with heroin, because they could hold his addiction over his head to force his cooperation as an informant. Or that would allow a guy arrested on a possession charge to be abandoned for days in a jail cell, nearly killing him.
For decades now, politicians, law enforcement officials, and drug warriors have spent a great deal of time, energy, and propaganda dehumanizing drug offenders. It shouldnt be all that surprising, then, when drug enforcement officials subsequently treat drug offenders as something less than human. If you arent fully human, you have no identity to steal. Or at the very least, your claim to your identity isnt as important the public good the government might do by stealing it. (In this case, public good means arresting a few drug pushers.) Likewise, less-than-human lives are more easily expended than human ones. A drug cop wouldn't dream of sending his own kid out as an informant. But once a kid gets caught possessing some pot or ecstasy or speed or God forbid selling it the kid lost the right to be treated like a fully realized human being. The cops are willing to take some risks.
I dont think the DEA wants Sondra Arquiett to be victimized by the criminals with whom they interact while pretending to be her. It also seems safe that drug cops didn't want to see Rachel Hoffman, Daniel Chong, Jonathan Magbie, Chad MacDonald, Logan, or Michael Saffioti to die. Its more that once they were known to be drug offenders, their lives weren't quite as important.
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