Baby Formula, FISA and Ordinary Crime

Recent fuss has been made of late regarding the conviction of Samih Jammal based upon his involvement with a bably formula theft and resell ring. The hubbub is all according to the use of FISA as a tool of fighting/investigating terrorism, yet convicting on a different crime entirely.

Drudge has a post here and an article from the Wall Street Journal is here.

Andrew McCarthy argues convincingly and logically at NRO that regardless of FISA or any other type of warrant used, law enforcement can and often convicts based on other evidence found at the location. For example: "Let's say the police get a search warrant based on probable cause that a man has robbed a bank and has the proceeds in his house. When they enter the house, though, they find a bag of cocaine on the table. The police are not required to ignore the cocaine simply because it's not the crime they got the warrant to investigate. Even if they never accuse the man of bank robbery, he may properly be charged and convicted for cocaine trafficking."

With reaction to this conviction possibly generating an overreactive outcry, it is often best to figure out whether or not what it is we are concerned about is actually a misuse of FISA or any other type of warrant. Unfortunately, for the most part we have overreacted to the NSA wiretap program. Another fine example is the new's latest poster child "illegal immigration."

NSA Wiretap
DeMediacrat
Domestic spying
Islamofascism
War On Terror